The city of Woodland’s water woes look to be coming to their end.
After at least five years of the city’s 500,000-gallon reservoir leaking, Woodland officials have OK’d a $3.7 million contract to build a new 1.5 million-gallon above-ground reservoir.
According to Travis Goddard, Woodland’s Community Development Director, the city currently has two reservoirs with a combined capacity of 1.5 million gallons. The project will nearly double the city’s water-storage capability.
Previous attempts to repair the leaking reservoir failed or were considered financially untenable, according to Goddard, and the state health department required the fix.
Goddard estimated that leakage in 2022 was in the ballpark of 12.6 million gallons. Former Woodland Public Works Director Tracy Coleman previously said the reservoir leaked about 10.5 million gallons a year.
To put those numbers into perspective, if a household had used those 12.6 million gallons of water, it would’ve cost more than $122,600 using the utility rates posted on the city’s website. The exact amount the city would have spent refilling the reservoir is unclear, as city officials were unable to provide The Daily News with the per-cubic-foot cost of treating drinking water.
The new reservoir will be three times the volume of its predecessor and will nearly double the city’s overall reservoir capacity.
Goddard said a new, larger reservoir was also a sound choice as the city grows, and wasting treated water wastes taxpayers’ money.
“It’s just bad stewardship of public money if we’re treating water and it’s leaking into the ground,” he said.
What is the plan?
Crews plan to demolish the leaking reservoir after the new one is complete.
The city contracted Kelso-based construction firm Advanced Excavating Services, and a company representative said the project is set to begin in late spring and finish the following spring.
Mayor Todd Dinehart said the city will pay for construction with a $5 million loan from the state’s Drinking Water State Revolving Fund which will carry a 2.25 percent interest rate to be paid over the course of 20 years. The city will be paying just over $316,000 annually through 2044 to the state for the loan. In total, the city will be on the hook for more than $6.3 million.
Surplus funds from the loan are being used to pay for a water filter restoration at the city’s water treatment plant, according to the city’s Nov. 20 meeting notes.
The Woodland City Council formally approved the contract for the reservoir project on Dec. 18.
History
Goddard said that after the leak was discovered in early 2019, the city spent $17,000 to hire contractors to assess potential repair costs. The cost to install a new liner and make the reservoir “seismically sound” was estimated at $200,000, according to Goddard. The quoted fixes carried no guarantee of actually resolving the leak, so repair plans were scrapped.
The city raised water rates in December, but Goddard said the rate hike was planned well in advance and that the new reservoir didn’t directly cause the increase. The city first OK’d raising the rates incrementally in 2020 but delayed planned increases as citizens complained about high water bills. At a late 2022 meeting, Coleman said the delays in issuing the increases had left less money for the city’s capital water projects, like replacing the reservoir and updating filters.
Dinehart said loan payments made to the Drinking Water State Revolving Fund will come from the city’s water fund, so the higher rates will be used to pay for reservoir construction.
