Oak Grove sewer bonds, vector control levy pass easily

Election results

By Anthony Roberts

The Clackamas Review, Nov 9, 2009

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An overwhelming majority of residents in the Oak Lodge Sanitary District approved borrowing up to $44 million for improvements at the wastewater treatment plant.

Voters across the county also overwhelmingly approved the renewal of a levy that funds vector control.

Eighty five percent of voters in the Oak Lodge District – about 32,000 people living in Oak Grove, Jennings Lodge, Oatfield Ridge and portions of Milwaukie and Gladstone – approved the measure. About 4,500 cast their vote.

The vote allows the district to move forward with $50 million in improvements at the 50-year-old plant on River Road that will expand capacity. The district has been fined for spilling sewage into the Willamette, including one incident on July 25 of this year, when 7,000 gallons of untreated sewage spilled into the river, according to the Department of Environmental Quality.

The project was set to move forward either way, but ditrcit officials said it would have actually cost more without the bond measure approval.

“Here’s the hook – the difference between a revenue bond, which our board already authorized last May, and a general obligation bond is $8 a month (per household), on the average over the life of these bonds, 20 year bonds,” said Michael Read, general manager of the district. “It translates into $22 million in savings on a $44 million bond, essentially $100 a year for each and every customer.”

With the vote, the average users bill will jump from $31.46 to about $39, but with the general revenue bonds, it would have jumped to $47.

Read said the project will likely start in February or March of 2010, and is scheduled to take about 30 months, but could be finished in two years.

Board president Paul Savas said the resounding victory was a product of a grassroots campaign.

“A team of citizen leaders in the Oak Lodge area went door-to-door and made sure every one of their neighbors learned about the dollar savings possible through the general obligation bonds,” Savas said. “The volunteers work made all the difference.”

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