County Aquifer Fee Ok, Judge Decides County Can Keep $3 Million Collected From City Residents

Spokane County does not have to refund more than $3 million collected from city residents to help build sewers in the suburbs, a Superior Court judge has ruled.

Judge Michael Donohue said there is nothing improper about the county’s aquifer protection fee, which is paid by anyone who owns land over Spokane’s underground water supply.

Calling the decision “merely a rationalization to justify the fees,” attorney Steve Eugster promised to challenge the decision in the state Court of Appeals.

“You have to expect when you’re confronting the status quo that you’re not going to win at the trial level,” he said.

Eugster filed the suit on behalf of Spokane resident Sandy Smith and 69,000 city water customers, each of whom pay $15 a year toward the aquifer fund. County officials said refunding the money would cost $3.1 million, and slow sewer construction significantly.

Eugster argued the fee was an illegal tax, since most of the money is spent outside the city limits. He also objected to the county using the fund to offset sewer bills for landowners, rather than spending it on projects that serve the whole community.

Donohue, in the decision released Friday, found nothing wrong with using the fee to keep sewer costs low. The fee is good for the entire community, he wrote.

“Everyone who draws water … benefits from the steps being taken to protect, preserve and rehabilitate the Spokane-Rathdrum aquifer,” he wrote.

However, Donohue agreed with Eugster that the county has not done all it should to collect fees from those who refuse to pay them.

Starting next year, landowners will pay their bills to the county treasurer, rather than the utility department, a step “that should aid in the collection of of these fees and … decrease the overall cost of billing,” Donohue wrote.

Eugster said good has come from the case, even if he loses his appeal.

The county recently signed an agreement promising the city $500,000 a year from the sewer fund. While county officials say the decision has nothing to do with the lawsuit, Eugster said he suspects otherwise.

“I’d like to think that the case brought substantial pressure on the county,” he said.

, DataTimes