Spring City seeks help to prevent flooding
By Suzanne Dean
4-9-08

SPRING CITY—The Spring City Council looked at a first draft of a letter last week that asked government agencies, including the U.S. Forest Service, for help cleaning out streams and ditches, and possibly taking other actions, to prevent flooding this spring.
Following flash floods in 1997, the Forest Service started keeping waterways on forest land east of the city limits clear. But, according to Ken Nunley, a citizen volunteer involved in emergency preparedness who was at the city council meeting Thursday, April 4, no one has cleared streambeds and ditches inside the city.
One problem, Nunley said, has been that after the streams flow into the city, they run across private property, and some private property owners haven’t wanted government workers coming onto their land.
But now, with a heavy spring runoff expected, there is danger that water will rush from the mountains down the cleared stream channels and as soon as they hit clogged channels inside the city limits will fan out across the land surface.
Nunley reported that Jeff Watson and Al Tripp, local residents who are regarded as experts on Spring City’s irrigation system, along with Matt Francks, water master for the Spring City Water Board, had pulled a satellite map of the Spring City area off the Internet and then walked the major watercourses shown to assess the condition of the channels.
The two men then drafted the letter, which Nunley presented to the council. The central message in the letter, Nunley told the city council, was that Spring City and the Spring City Water Board needed to either investigate ways to divert water coming out of the mountains or clean the water courses. But, he said, the job is too big for Spring City to handle alone.
Councilman Boyd Mickel said the city planned to join the water board in signing the letter’s final draft. He said the letter needed to tell the Forest Service, “We’re putting you on notice. You set us up for disaster. Now what are you going to do? We’ve got to have some help.”
Another major topic at the meeting was a possible water rate increase. Mickel reported that he had devoted some time to studying water system revenue and expenses. To “meet the bond and the maintenance needs that we have,” rates must be raised, he said.
Currently, households using 1,000 gallons or less, and homes whose meters aren’t connected, pay nothing. But Mickel said those households are using water. And if those households paid the base rate, Mickel estimated the city would get $4,400 per month in additional revenue.
So his first proposal was that all households with meter service be charged the base rate “whether you turn on your tap or not.” A mobile home park in the city uses a single connection and meter to serve all units. He proposed that each mobile home also be charged the base fee.
Secondly, he suggested raising the base rate from $21 currently to $25 per month. That would cover the first 3,000 gallons.
Under the schedule Mickel proposed, households using 3,000-7,000 gallons would pay $1.50 per 1,000 gallons in excess of the 3,000-gallon base. Households using 7,000-15,000 gallons would pay $2 per 1,000 gallons for the overage above 7,000 gallons. He proposed further graduations for users of 15,000-20,000 gallons and for connections using 20,000 gallons or more.
Workman said he supported an increase in the base rate but opposed Mickel’s graduated rate schedule “because it penalizes larger families.”
He added, “I don’t think somebody who has 10 people in their household should pay more per gallon than somebody with two people” (in the household.) He said he felt a single base rate should apply to usage up to 15,000 gallons.
Mayor Eldon Barnes said the city was developing its 2008-09 budget and suggested the council take up the water rates in the context of a discussion of the water portion of the budget. With that suggestion, the council tabled the issue.
The council also took up, and passed, revisions to its animal control ordinance, a measure it has been considering for about six months.
A hearing on the ordinance last fall brought out a roomful of residents. Most were concerned about a proposal to limit the number of dogs a household could keep.
As passed, the ordinance defines any dog that bites someone without provocation, whether loose or confined on the owner’s property, as a “vicious” dog and makes the dog subject to impoundment.
The ordinance also makes it illegal for an animal to defecate or urinate on public or private property, other than the owner’s property, and requires owners to clean up after their dogs. Owners who permit their animals to violate the provisions become subject to the town’s nuisance laws.
Similarly, a dog that “barks, whines, howls or makes other disturbing noises in an excessive, continuous, or untimely fashion day or night” is subject to impoundment.
Mt. Pleasant City handles animal control for Spring City. Currently, the fee for getting a dog out of the pound is $25 for the first offense and $50 for the second offense. City Recorder Deborah Dahl said those fees need to be increased but the specific increases would be voted on later.
The council did not change a controversial section of the ordinance related to kennels. As passed, the ordinance prohibits commercial kennels boarding guest animals. But it permits private kennels for keeping one’s own dogs or for breeding dogs, with no limit on the number of dogs an owner may keep. However, it requires owners to keep kennels in a clean, sanitary condition. Owners who fail to do so are subject to citations.