Mt. Vernon wastewater treatment plant under emergency protocol with DNR

Allegedly, some sludge may have been sitting at the plant for as long as 10 years thanks to former contractor
The Mt. Vernon Wastewater Treatment Plant is holding up to 1.4 million gallons of sludge, and the plant is now under emergency protocol with the Department of Natural Resources, City Administrator Max Springer told the Mt. Vernon Board of Aldermen during their meeting on Tuesday, Dec. 10.
Springer said the plant’s condition is due to a former operator, Clean Streams Enterprises, LLC, which was in charge of both operating the plant and hauling away the sludge.
“The operator we had hired … allowed the plant to get in pretty bad shape, so we’re under an emergency protocol with the Department of Natural Resources right at the moment,” he said. “The creek looks terrible, (and) our facilities are full of sludge.”
Springer said the operator was hired to haul away the sludge, but did not do so.
“He was supposed to be hauling sludge,” Springer said, “and we paid him monthly for sludge hauling and we paid him for operating the plant. He hadn’t hauled any sludge.”
Springer said the city tried to work with the operator to get him to do the job he was supposed to do, but just couldn’t get him to reply to any communications.
“We’ve tried to get him to haul all year, basically. It finally got to the point we just didn’t have any place to go with anything. He wasn’t responding, so that’s where we requested you let him go.”
Springer said a new contractor, Hillhouse Services, is hauling about three truckloads of sludge a day to Springfield’s treatment plant, where it is being processed through their digestor, and added Springfield might be able to take more if the city switches to hauling sludge during evening and nighttime hours.
Sludge is also being spread on fallow farmland as fertilizer. Springer said a number of landowners have been receptive to having sludge applied to their land as fertilizer, as it comes with no cost to them. The sludge is applied, the soil is tested, and in cases where the soil is acidic, lime is spread on the soil, all at no cost to the landowner.
 “It is good fertilizer and it’s free,” Springer said. “It doesn’t cost them anything. We test the ground for them, and in this case, we’re going to be applying the lime as well, because we have to get this sludge out of our plant.”
Springer reported, 72,000 gallons of sludge had been disposed of that day by hauling it to Springfield and applying it to soil.
“It doesn’t make a dent in the 1.4 million gallons we estimate we’ve got, but we’re working on it,” he said. At another point in the meeting, Springer estimated some of the sludge may have been sitting in storage tanks for as long as 10 years. In a later interview, Springer said 356,800 gallons of sludge had been removed from the plant as of Friday, Dec. 13. Currently, the city is paying $3,000 per day to have the sludge removed.
Springer also reported the wastewater treatment plant itself is in need of repairs due to neglect by a former operator. The plant, he said, was designed to run automatically, but for the last three or four years, the operator ran it manually.
“If they had a problem, they wouldn’t report it to us,” Springer said. “They just bypassed and worked some other way, and so what we’ve got is a mess.”
Because the Board of Aldermen won’t meet again until Jan. 8, 2020, Springer requested spending authority so repairs could be made to the plant. The board voted to give him spending authority of up to $35,000; any spending needed over that before the next meeting can be ratified by the board through an e-mail vote.
The board also voted to approve a three-year contract with Frantz Water Solutions, LLC. The owner, Alan Frantz, is an experienced wastewater treatment plant operator; he currently runs the treatment plants in Exeter and Golden City. Frantz takes over from another contractor, Everett Williams LLC, who worked with the city for about a week and a half before deciding running the plant was too much for them.
Frantz’s contract states he is “qualified and holds all licenses and insurances necessary to provide the services requested by the City of Mt. Vernon.”
Under the contract, Frantz will operate the plant five days a week, as well as complete any emergency work and operate the plant during rain events outside of the plant’s normal operating hours. He will also be responsible for all paperwork required by the Department of Natural Resources.
The city will pay Frantz $10,000 per month for the first three months of the contract, and $8,500 per month for the remainder of the contract.
Frantz had proposed two contracts, one for one calendar year where he would be paid $10,000 per month for three months and $8,500 per month for the remaining nine months, and another for three calendar years where he would be paid $8,500 per month for the duration of the contract, but Mayor David Eden proposed extending Frantz’s one-year contract to three years, so Frantz will be paid $10,000 per month for the first three months and $8,500 per month for the remaining three years.
“He’s pulling us out of a tight spot” Eden said. “Why don’t we reward him for that?”
Springer also said the city would remain in control of hauling sludge from the plant, which is supposed to be done every 90 days under normal conditions, rather than again putting the operation of the plant and the hauling of the sludge under the control of one contractor.
In other business…
The board voted to accept three proposed exemptions to receiving trash service from Doty. The first exemption is to residences that have a water meter for irrigation of a garden or other agriculture site in addition to utilities that service the residence. They will not have to have additional trash service at the site of the meter.
The second exemption is for structures which have electricity but no sewer or water services. They are not required to have trash service.
The final exemption is for any structure, such as a backyard cottage, that is a lawful residential accessory use to a residence. They are not required to have trash service, so long as the primary residence has trash service.
The board also passed an ordinance which creates a two-hour parking limit on the east side of Hickory Street between Center and Water Streets.
Earlier in the meeting, the board heard from Megan Clark, senior planner with the Southwest Missouri Council of Governments (SMCOG). Clark presented the board with an inventory of the city’s sidewalks, conducted between Aug. 1 through Oct. 31. The inventory found that 53.7-percent, or 7.07 miles of the city’s sidewalks are in good condition, 27-percent, or 3.55 miles are in fair condition, and 19.3-percent, or 2.55 miles are in poor condition. The inventory also recommended the city focus on “repairing and maintaining existing infrastructure.”