By Natalie BazinetStaff Writer
LIMESTONE — The second public meeting was held last Wednesday about the new sewer system underway in Limestone. The community Development Block Grant (CDGB) meeting was held by the Limestone Water and Sewer department at the Town Office in an effort to obtain public feedback on the project. This meeting was regarding phase three of this multifaceted project known as the greater Limestone regional project.
“The project is a consolidation of two utilities,” said Steven C. Hallowell, P.E, Senior Project Manager with engineering company Wright-Pierce, “the Limestone Water and Sewer district and the Loring Development Authority (LDA).”
Under the project, Limestone, which currently has it’s own wastewater plant which discharges into the Limestone stream, will pump it’s wastewater about five miles to the new LDA wastewater treatment plant.
“The Limestone sewer and water district will abandon their existing wastewater plant and pump it to the Loring Development Authority, which is about five miles away; the Limestone sewer and water district will take over the Loring development wastewater treatment facility. From Loring, they will provide secondary wastewater treatment, which will be discharged into the Little Madawaska River,” said Hallowell. “This project will eliminate the discharge into the Limestone stream, replace antiquated equipment, and consolidate treatment facilities,” Hallowell added.
The greater Limestone project will cost about 11.5 million dollars. The district has already secured 10.45 million dollars and is still waiting to hear about subsequent funding from the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the Maine Department of Environmental Protection (DEP).
“The district has completed one sewer replacement program; it was completed about a year ago. They just signed the contract for the second phase of which utilized the first round of the DCBG funds, and tonight we’re talking about the third phase sewer replacement, which is going to be more DEP and CDBG funding,” said Hallowell, “so all total, you’re looking at almost 15 million dollars to be pumped into the Limestone area, at least into water facilities.”
“There have been a couple of driving factors behind this project,” said Hallowell, “The water quality regulations are very stringent requirements, waste discharge requirements into the Limestone stream are basically dictating the removal of the outfall and basically to a larger stream, which would be the little Madawaska river.
If the Town of Limestone was to keep their current wastewater treatment plant, it would mean updating the facility at significant cost because the town would be buying alone, versus combining resources with the Loring Development Authority.
There is also a chance that even if Limestone were to update the wastewater treatment plant, it would still need to be shut down in the next few years due to the high sensitivity of the Limestone stream, similar to what happened in Presque Isle.
“There are cases like this in other parts of the state, treatment facilities that discharge into very sensitive
streams are basically forced to do either land application or pump it to a longer distances; Presque Isle is a case of that.”
“The current sewer system was last updated in 1981.” said Leighton. “It was a substantial upgrade at that point to get in to where we’re at now. LDA’s treatment facility was built in the early 1950s, and that’s been upgraded a couple times since.”
Though the town is moving the plant, jobs will not decrease.
“If anything, we’ll be increasing staff,” said Jim Leighton, Superintendent of the Limestone Water and Sewer District.
Some of the grants, which have been written by Dave Wylie, a grant writer and consultant for the Town of Limestone, require public support and participation.
“To apply for the next round of funds,” Wylie said, “we need public participation; it’s one of the requirements of getting this particular type of grant. The more citizen participation, the better,” Wylie added.
