Feces, toilet paper in yards. Nicholasville residents file sewer complaint with EPA
A lawyer for neighbors opposed to the development of a golf course has filed a complaint with federal environmental officials alleging the city of Nicholasville violated the federal Clean Water Act repeatedly for more than a decade.
“Nicholasville’s wastewater treatment plant has been over capacity for several years, and for the past 16 years, feces, urine, sanitary napkins, toilet paper and other bodily fluids have repeatedly spewed out of manholes and onto the yards of the homeowners who live in close proximity to the golf course,” wrote Bruce Simpson, a lawyer for residents who have been fighting a more than 300-unit housing development on the once-private Lone Oak Golf Course in Nicholasville.
The March 6 letter was addressed to Mary S. Walker, region IV administrator for the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. The letter asks for an investigation and possible action by the EPA.
The EPA enforces the federal Clean Water Act, which regulates the discharge of pollutants into the nation’s surface waters, including lakes, rivers, streams and wetlands.
Simpson said he filed the complaint on behalf of his clients.
Lone Oak development prompted EPA Complaint
The letter said state environmental cabinet officials have repeatedly failed to force Nicholasville to improve and fix its sewer and stormwater system, resulting in sewage spewing from manholes into people’s yards and into Jessamine County creeks and waterways.
The Nicholasville City Commission took its first vote Monday to approve a zone change for 316 houses and fourplexes for Lone Oak Golf Course. There was no discussion before the commission’s vote, according to those that attended the Monday meeting. Those who voted in favor include Mayor Pete Sutherland, Doug Blackford, Betty Black and Patty Teater. Alex Carter abstained from the vote. No one voted against.
A final vote on the zone change is likely at the March 23 city commission meeting. The city commission voted in favor despite the planning commission denying the zone change twice in the past six months.
In October, the Nicholasville Planning Commission voted 6-4 against a similar zone change for 343 housing units on the golf course. Lone Oak LLC ultimately withdrew its zone change application before the city commission could consider it.
In January, Lone Oak LLC filed another request but decreased the number of housing units to 316.
On Feb. 24, the Nicholasville Planning Commission voted 6-5 to deny the zone change.
A key issue in the fight over the zone change has been whether the city has enough capacity in its sewer system for the new development. Flooding and stormwater overflows into yards near the golf course have been problematic for a decade, residents close to the golf course say.
Jimmy Calhoun, who lives on Runnymeade Court near the Lone Oak Golf Course, said he’s been living with stormwater overflows from a manhole in his yard for 16 years. In a video shown at a February planning commission meeting on the Lone Oak Golf Course zone change, Calhoun showed his yard strewn with toilet paper and feces after two inches of rain on Dec. 17.
“That’s all toilet paper,” Calhoun showed in the video of the white refuse left in his yard. “It’s toilet paper with feces in it. It goes all the way down to the creek.”
Nicholasville plant over capacity
The complaint to the EPA alleges Nicholasville was required to update its facility plan — which shows its wastewater treatment systems — every ten years. Its last plan was updated in 2002. A letter from state Energy and Environmental Cabinet officials in 2014 asked for the updated plan by 2015. The city ignored the request, records Simpson obtained from the Energy and Environmental Cabinet show.
More than four years later, another cabinet letter was sent in 2018 to the city, asking for the plan. That letter showed the state had still not received updated information on Nicholasville’s facility treatment plan.
Minutes of a 2018 meeting between the state and Nicholasville officials showed that the city needed to expand its stormwater and sewer capacity by more than 30 percent. That meant an updated facility plan was needed, according to the complaint.
The updated facilities plan was eventually sent to the state in February 2020— eight years late, the complaint to the EPA alleges.
It was not until January 2020 that the city and state entered into a proposed agreed order to fix the problems in the stormwater and sewer system.
Bob Amato, Nicholasville’s public utilities director, said as part of that agreement, the city will expand the capacity of its treatment facility by 30 percent. That $20 million expansion should be completed by late 2022. The city is also addressing the stormwater overflows. But that is not part of the agreement with the state.
“We did a project in the Lone Oak area in 2011,” Amato said. “It relieved some of the problems, but it didn’t fix all of it.”
Nicholasville says it’s fixing sewer problems
The city is currently working on a second study to determine why so much water is getting into the sanitary sewer system in that area, which causes the manhole overflows and sewage in Calhoun’s yard. That project will start in the next month or so, Amato said.
The city’s wastewater treatment plant went over its regulated capacity in January 2019, Amato said. That happened in part because of higher-than-expected rainfall totals in 2018.
There are no pollutants discharged from the city’s wastewater treatment plant despite the fact it is over capacity, Amato said. In fact, he said the wastewater treatment plant has received multiple awards from state regulators.
“We have received five consecutive operational excellence awards for our wastewater treatment plant from 2013 to 2018” he said.
Stormwater overflows or manhole overflows are Clean Water Act violations, he said.
“But we report all of those to the state and the EPA,” Amato said.
But the complaint alleges the state has repeatedly not enforced the federal Clean Water Act by failing to force Nicholasville to fix its ailing sewer and stormwater system.
A spokesman with the Energy and Environmental Cabinet did not respond to an email requesting comment.
The state has agreed to allow ten new developments to tap into NIcholasville’s overcapacity wastewater treatment facility despite the fact it is currently running at 600,000 gallons over its permitted capacity, the complaint alleges. Those 10 new developments will add an additional 600,000 gallons per day of sewage flow into its treatment plant. The plant has a capacity of 4.1 million gallons per day but is currently “operating at 4.8 million gallons of flow per day,” Simpson wrote.
When all 10 of those developments are added, Nicholasville treatment plant will be 1.3 million gallons per day over its rated capacity. It’s not clear when all of those developments will come on line.
But Amato said that 600,000 additional gallons is not entirely accurate. That’s the maximum amount. And that’s if all new users use that maximum amount at the same time, he said.
But the complaint says Nicholasville should have never approved those new developments without expanding its current capacity and fixing its current overflow problems.
“These new developments will be allowed to tap into a grossly substandard sanitary sewer system while longtime Nicholasville residents will continue to suffer the devastating consequences associated with thousands of gallons of raw sewage being spewed upon their homeplaces,” Simpson wrote.
Simpson said he has not yet heard back from the EPA on the status of the complaint. It does not have to move forward with an investigation.
It was the EPA — not the state — that forced Lexington to fix its long-standing stormwater overflows through a settlement agreement in 2011. It was a complaint by a group of citizens to the EPA that prompted that settlement. Lexington is currently in the middle of a more than 12-year, nearly $590 million sewer and stormwater upgrade.
This story was originally published March 11, 2020 at 7:30 AM.
