The economy may soon receive a boost from new businesses,
despite the sewer moratorium, after the Hollister City Council
Monday approved a policy allowing the use of temporary sewage
holding tanks Monday night.
Hollister – The economy may soon receive a boost from new businesses, despite the sewer moratorium, after the Hollister City Council Monday approved a policy allowing the use of temporary sewage holding tanks Monday night.
The council unanimously approved a resolution that will allow some businesses to construct and use sewage holding tanks, independent of the city’s sewer system, to circumvent the moratorium. Business owners would be responsible for constructing and regularly pumping the temporary holding tanks as well as shipping the sewage out of town for treatment. When the moratorium is lifted – which may not be until late 2006 or early 2007 according to City Manager Clint Quilter’s most recent reports – business owners would be required to have their holding tanks removed and would then hook up to the city’s system.
The push behind the holding tank resolution is the idea that it will help the economic vitality of Hollister, according to Ken Lindsay, a local developer who helped bring the concept to the council’s attention. Local businesses looking to expand their operations before the May 2002 sewer spill and the resulting building moratorium have been facing relocating or going out of business, according to Lindsay. And new businesses looking to come to town think better of it when they find out they may not be able to build until 2007, he said.
The use of temporary holding tanks may be a solution to both of these problems, at least for businesses that were looking to expand or move into Hollister before the 15 million gallon sewer spill, according to Lindsay. The new policy isn’t meant to encourage widespread development in Hollister before the moratorium is lifted, Quilter said at the Jan. 10 council meeting, but merely to sustain the city’s economic viability until then.
The resolution also includes a provision that the tanks will be subject to state and city environmental reviews and can be shut down at any time at the council’s discretion.
“If we run into a problem and it looks like there’s going to be too many or there’s going to be an environmental issue, I don’t think we have to keep approving them,” Quilter told the council last night.
Quilter also pushed the idea of above-ground holding tanks rather than the underground tanks he had mentioned to the council on Jan. 10. Above-ground tanks would increase visibility and make it easier for maintenance crews to spot problems, he said. They would also be easier to remove once a business hooks up to the city’s sewer system, he said.
Dist. 5 Councilwoman Monica Johnson told Quilter she was concerned the above-ground tanks would be an eyesore.
“I have concerns about driving around the community and seeing 1,000-gallon tanks everywhere,” she said.
But Quilter reassured her the council would have full jurisdiction over where the tanks could go and how many there could be, and could also require tanks to be screened-in as some dumpsters are.
The Regional Water Quality Control Board, which imposed the sewer moratorium after the 2002 spill, doesn’t have any jurisdiction over holding tanks, according to the RWQCB’s Matt Keeling. They will be concerned with the holding tank idea though if it does become widespread, according to Keeling. But the board is fine with a few holding tanks here and there to keep Hollister’s economy alive, he said, as long as the sewage is regularly pumped and disposed of out of town.
Lindsay has estimated construction of an underground cement tank could cost business owners between $5,000 and $20,000, depending on how large a tank is needed. After construction, pumping, transportation and disposal would cost a few hundred dollars a load, he said. The cost could be worth it to companies facing relocation costs if they had to leave Hollister to expand or build, Lindsay said.
Under the resolution passed last night, businesses will be eligible for holding tanks only if they fulfill several requirements, including location on land already zoned for commercial and industrial use. Even if a business does meet all the requirements, it will still be up to the council to approve or reject individual projects.
