The City of Stevenson

Rebuilding Community Trust and Generating Innovative Infrastructure Solutions

The Challenge

Stevenson is a small city located in Southwest Washington, nestled above the Columbia River. With a population of around 1,600, it boasts a strong local brewing industry and benefits from plenty of seasonal tourism. 

During the Summer of 2017, Stevenson faced an Administrative Order issue by Washington Department of Ecology (Ecology) to reduce organic pollution (as measured by Biological Oxygen Demand (BOD) and Total Suspended Solids (TSS)) by increasing the capacity of their wastewater treatment plant (WWTP). The price tag for this increased capacity was estimated at $14M – a large financial burden for this small community and its local industries. 

The Opportunity

The City secured a loan from Ecology to engage the community in exploring innovative solutions to this expensive challenge. CSI helped cover the cost with funds from a federal Economic Development Administration grant, meant to help economically distressed communities throughout the Pacific Northwest find innovative, sustainable solutions to their infrastructure challenges.

City staff, stakeholders and the CSI team toured the treatment plant and several local businesses that contribute significant organic pollution loads to the system, gaining important knowledge for generating possible solutions. 

CSI then brought stakeholders and City staff together for an all-day workshop, and through a process of ‘value planning,’ generated innovative solutions that could deliver more value, at less cost, than the ‘system expansion’ option.  A wide swath of the community was represented, including the major industrial users of the WWTP system, all of whom would be facing rate hikes.  

The day began with the group identifying key local values that would then serve as success criteria for possible solutions.  The process then helped participants look at the challenge through a whole-system lens, and collaborate on possible new approaches. Starting with the group’s core shared values helped re-build trust between the City and community, which had been shaken due to the earlier proposed solution and costly rate hikes. 

During the Summer of 2017, Stevenson faced an Administrative Order issue by Washington Department of Ecology (Ecology) to reduce organic pollution (as measured by Biological Oxygen Demand (BOD) and Total Suspended Solids (TSS)) by increasing the capacity of their wastewater treatment plant (WWTP). The price tag for this increased capacity was estimated at $14M – a large financial burden for this small community and its local industries. 

During Value Planning a wide swath of the community was represented, including the major industrial users of the WWTP system, all of whom would be facing rate hikes.  and began by sharing their values to help re-build trust between the City and community.

    One key concept: reduce specific organic and liquid loading of the system (primarily from breweries and restaurants) to avoid straining particular elements of the small treatment plant.

One idea that was generated: Developing a Waterfront Brewery District – develop collaborative agreements and infrastructure that generate value and minimize costs among brewers, including shared facilities for pre-treatment of wastes and other common facilities for tenants. The concept could expand to include brewpubs, tourist activities and perhaps other mixed uses if the economic demand justified the investment. 

 

Results

The concepts generated during the workshop identified a possible pathway toward regulatory compliance and additional future capacity while still reducing costs. One key concept was to reduce specific organic and liquid loading of the system (primarily from breweries and restaurants) to avoid straining particular elements of the small treatment plant.  Five interrelated strategies emerged from the dozens of alternatives generated during the workshop: 

1.    Side-Streaming and Resource Recovery – collect organic waste directly from beverage industries and restaurants for potential re-sale or collection. 

2.    Satellite Treatment Systems – reduce inputs of liquid waste by augmenting the existing, centralized WWTP with satellite treatment systems better suited to address variable loading (e.g. a major portion of organic pollution comes directly from Skamania Lodge).

3.    Phased Approach – make targeted, phased upgrades to the WWTP to address BOD. 

4.    Botanical Garden – build a community garden that processes gray water to an environmentally safe level, reducing loads on the treatment plant and resulting in a beautiful new draw for tourists.

5.    Waterfront Brewery District – develop collaborative agreements and infrastructure that generate value and minimize costs among brewers, including shared facilities for pre-treatment of wastes and other common facilities for tenants. The concept could expand to include brewpubs, tourist activities and perhaps other mixed uses if the economic demand justified the investment.

Now What?

The new approach consists of various incremental steps that help the community address its wastewater permit issues in the near term, generate additional community value and provide for incremental growth in capacity as needed.

Stevenson has now taken significant steps to implement project elements, which has improved their outlook since the workshop took place.  Industrial WWTP users have made vigorous side-streaming efforts, installing new equipment and shipping side-stream material to a local Dirt Huggers for inclusion in high quality compost and soil products, all resulting in a dramatic reduction of influent BOD.  The City is now running the WWTP in-house and have made a number of improvements that have increased plant efficiency and resulted in a dramatic reduction of biosolids (over 85% in February, 2020). 

Feedback

“Ultimately, this value planning workshop received a wildly positive response from everyone involved for many reasons, but the main ones were: 1) it allowed the city and the community to work together to find possible solutions 2) it created a real sense of empowerment within the community about the project  and 3) it generated real, practical solutions for the community and the city to move forward with.” 

Kari Fagerness Former EDC Director, Skamania County