Spokane voters may be asked to rejoin 41-year-old aquifer district in which homeowners pay $15 a year

Spokane voters may be asked later this year whether to re-enter a regional aquifer protection coalition that the city left 21 years ago, with most homewners paying no more than $15 per year – roughly the same they paid 40 years ago when the partnership first formed.

City officials argue rejoining the Spokane County Aquifer Protection Area is necessary to get ahead of higher pollution standards and protect the region’s main drinking water source from newly regulated pollutants, such as PFAS, found in firefighting foams, or 6ppd-quinone, created by tire dust.

“Protection of our sole source aquifer is critical to the City of Spokane because we operate the largest drinking water utility in the region,” Mayor Lisa Brown said in a Monday statement. “The opportunity to rejoin the APA is important as we face new threats to the health of our sole-source aquifer by things like PFAS and other contaminants, climate change, and increased urban activities over the aquifer.”

The Spokane City Council will be asked in April to approve putting the measure on ballots. The county will also soon have to decide when to put forward a ballot measure to renew the partnership itself – both measures are expected to be on the same ballot either in August or November.

The Spokane County Aquifer Protection Area was created in 1985 to protect the Spokane Valley/Rathdrum Prairie Aquifer from pollution, primarily by expanding sewer systems and ending the region’s reliance on septic systems. Voters at the time overwhelmingly approved to pay the fee, which cost homeowners $15 a year for homes connected to a sewer system and $30 for homes still on septic tanks.

The program was highly successful at its goals at the time. When the Aquifer Protection Area was first approved, there were about 40,000 septic tanks in the “aquifer sensitive area,” including 2,700 in the city of Spokane. By 2004, there had been a net reduction of 20,000 septic tanks, of which fewer than 350 were left in city limits.

Voters were asked at the end of 2004 to renew the aquifer fees, ultimately approving by slim margins. However, the city had by then already decided months before to pull out of the partnership, arguing it needed more control over the funds paid by its residents.

At the time, the protection area collected around $2.75 million annually, about half of which came from Spokane residents. The county had pushed for $525,000 of the city’s collection to subsidize septic tank removal and sewer system buildout in the newly incorporated city of Spokane Valley, which was created in 2003. The city council, balking at this proposal, voted unanimously to exit the partnership, opting instead to protect the aquifer with city funds.

The city also felt it had largely accomplished its goals to move its residents from septic to sewer, ending the need for the additional funding, noted Marlene Feist, director of Spokane’s public works division.

Multiple things have changed since then, Feist added, including new pollution requirements. The new agreement also would only allow city ratepayer funds to leave the city for limited education and testing programs that benefit the entire aquifer system, but not for subsidizing infrastructure in other cities, Feist continued.

If city voters were to approve re-entering the Aquifer Protection Area , it would cost $15 per year for single-family homes connected to water. Multifamily and commercial properties would be charged based on the size of their water meters.

The protection area also imposes an additional maximum $15 annual fee for homes not connected to municipal sewer systems. Only the 300 or so homes still not connected to the city sewer system would have to pay the fee, which would be waived for the vast majority of the city’s 75,000 utility accounts.