Banner Graphic, Volume 13, Number 96, Greencastle, Putnam County, 29 December 1982 — Page 12

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The Putnam County Banner-Graphic, December 29,1982

Sewage saga

$32 billion horror stories from bustling Orlando to tiny Artesian, S. D.

(c) 1982 Chicago Sun-Times ORLANDO, Fla -The growing flow of sewage has become an alarming hindrance to development in this evergreen city of orange and palm trees and threatens to drag down one of the Sun Belt’s most phenomenal booms. Neither the city nor Orange County has built enough sewage treatment capacity to keep up with Greater Orlando’s sudden growth into a metropolis of 725,000. Now, they are having to play a high-cost and high-stakes game of catch-up. WORSE YET, STATE officials have given them only until 1984 to begin eliminating their treated discharges into the renowned bass-fishing waters of central Florida. Thousands of other U.S. communities are facing the same problem of too much sewage and too little capacity. In the older cities and suburbs of the North and Midwest, the problem is compounded by rupturing and collapsing sewers. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, after dispensing more than $32 billion in sewage-treatment construction grants since 1972, has found troublesome signs that the clean-water campaign has barely begun: -Despite this collossal investment, fewer than half of 198 major cities surveyed in 1980 consistently met the secondarytreatment standard. -TWELVE CITIES EITHER never came close to complying or they complied five per cent of the time or less. -EPA officials estimate it will take $91.1 billion-in addition to the $32 billion already obligated-to meet the backlog of sewagetreatment needs. -Of that immense sum, $5.8 billion is needed to rehabilitate antiquated sewer systems. The New York area alone requires $3.3 billion in work; Baltimore, $1.6 billion. -It will take an additional $28.8 billion to meet the needs of Orlando and other fast-growing areas between now and the year 2000. IF ORLANDO IS THE quintessential boomtown, then Artesian, S.D., is the archtypical small town growing smaller, its boarded-up buildings weathering to a septia-brown tint, its economy withering on the vine. “We’re setting here with a little over 200 people and most of them are over 60,” said Ron Emmett, town board chairman. “You can almost count the young families on one hand.” Contrary to the implication of its name, Artesian has water problems. As many as eight households have to share one shallow well. The water, when the pressure is adequate, is so rusty it stains the wash. Without a public water system, Emmett said, Artesian cannot even hope to woo industry. And without hydrants, it cannot do much about big fires. WHILE ORLANDO IS rushing to embrace the future, Artesian is marking time, recalling the windy day in 1970 when fire swept through the business district, jumped the highway and destroyed two grain elevators before volunteer firefighters could beat it out with wet gunny sacks. “They saved the Livestock State Bank by dumping 3,000 gallons of milk on the roof,” said Violet Hufford, wife of the town gravedigger and schoolbus driver. Only two federal agencies stand ready to assist small communities in Artesian’s predicament-The Farmers Home Administration and, to a lesser extent, the Department of Housing and Urban Development. Artesian sought a $375,000 HUD grant in 1979, but it lost out in the fierce competition for limited funds. Since 1965, the Farmers Home Administration has provided more than $5 billion in loans and grants for rural water systems, but that sum represents only a small part of the massive federal investment in dams, aqueducts and irrigation projects in the parched West. IN 1980, A PRESIDENTIAL task force on water policy predicted that U.S. cities would need $75 billion to sllO billion over the next 20 years to repair or replace their water works and mains and to develop new sources of supply. By boosting water rates and issuing revenue bonds, four of five municipal water systems should be able to raise the money, the task force said. But the national shortfall will range from $lO billion to sl3 billion. Faced with that shortfall, several congressmen have proposed a flurry of options: Give the Midwest and East a more equitable share of the nation’s water-resources budget, now weighted 3 to 1 in the favor of the South and West. Establish a water bank to help municipal water systems finance repairs and improvements. Create an aid program for cities akin to the Farmers Home Administration program for rural areas. Begin funneling water grants through the states the way the EPA funnels sewage-treatment construction grants. ULTIMATELY, THERE IS no separating the questions of water supply and sewage disposal. They are commingled, perforce by the laws of hydrology and hydraulics. Water, once used by industry or flushed down a toilet, becomes sewage. Unless it is properly treated and discharged, it can foul the sources of freshwater-the underground aquifers, lakes and rivers. And water from badly leaking mains can seep into old sewers, increasing the flow to overloaded sewage plants.

Officials

Council was won by Democrat Richard Asbell, Route 2, Greencastle. Replacing Norman Knights, Asbell will serve those residents living in Greencastle Township. Township trustees expected to take part in Saturday’s activities include: Monroe Township-Willard Scobee, a Democrat. Floyd Township-Emmett McPherson, a Democrat. Washington Township-Donald Bain, a Republican. JACKSON TOWNSHIP-Helen Galford, a Republican. Jefferson Township-Larry Salsman, a Democrat.

Patter

ber of health services, a fact that should be noted with appreciation by those who make pills, those who sell them, and those who tell when to take them and how many. 10. Didn’t merely break a New Year’s resolution to keep Christmas spending at manageable levels. Resolve was shattered these past few weeks, and lights from the poor house shine ever brighter. The above list is only a few of the highlights and could go on and on if there was room to include all the nice people I’ve

Simplistic as all this sounds, urban planners and engineers have paid too little heed to the cycle of water and sewage. It has taken water shortages and sewer overflows to dramatize this elementary point. MOREOVER, OPERATORS of sewer systems are bedeviled by the same problems plaguing water works managers. They usually are making do with limited funds, trying to hold miles of underground plumbing together and keep all their pumps and filters working. In many places, operators set water and sewer fees “on the basis of what they though grandma could pay,” one General Accounting Office auditor said. Two-thirds of West Virginia’s water systems serve fewer than 200 customers and do not generate enough revenue for adequate operation and maintenance. In many cash-short cities, preventive maintenance is a myth. Durable as iron pipe has proved to be, corrosion from within and without takes its toll. Moreover, iron, clay tile, mortar and brick crack under the tremors of street traffic and the stresses of land subsidence. Many sewers and water mains in Boston, New York and other Eastern cities date from the mid-19th Century. A few are wooden relics. Louisville, Ky., still relies on mains laid during the Civil War. POOR MAINTENANCE ultimately boomerangs on those cities that practice it. The Chicago suburb of Cicero has been losing more than 4.3 million gallons of water a day, primarily because of leaking mains. In Washington, D.C., one-third of the sewage going into an overloaded treatment plant is actually water lost from dripping faucets and mains. Repair and replacement projects in a built-up city can be complicated and costly. “We did a sewer job on a narrow street on Beacon Hill,” said Charles Button, chief engineer for the Boston Water and Sewer Commission. “To get at the sewer system, which dated from 1935. we had to take out the gas main, the electric and telephone conduits and the water system. Because the water pipe dated from 1954, we replaced it along with the sewer pipe.” Compounding the costs, of course, are bureaucratic delays, inflation and the high interest rates that cities must offer if they are to sell their revenue bonds. Water and sewer projects, moreover, are not immune to fraud and waste. Last month, a federal grand jury in Atlanta indicted a contractor on charges of faking repairs on sewer joints. AUDITORS FOR THE EPA and U.S. General Accounting Office have documented cases of horrendous cost overruns and engineering debacles. Some sewage-treatment plants simply have never worked as designed. When Orlando opened a $67-million regional treatment plant two years ago, it worked fine. Trouble was, the flow of sewage was so great that the new plant was operating at almost full capacity. “The day that plant went into service, we had no net growth in capacity,” said public works director Robert Haven. “Somebody was a little short-sighted in their planning. It wasn't me.” When he took over, Orlando's boom was about to sink in a quagmire of sewage. Florida officials had prohibited “The City Beautiful,” as unabashed boosters call it, and Orange County from hooking up more homes and businesses to their sewers. They also had wrung agreements from the city and county to stop discharging effluent from their treatment plants into streams by 1988. THAT LEFT THE CITY and county with but two optionswater conservation and recycling. “Since we’re living on our groundwater here, it makes sense to conserve it and not send it down a stream into the ocean," Haven said. Orlando intends to supply every water customer with free water-saving shower heads, faucet aerators and toilet dams. The expected 20 per cent drop in water use, Haven said, would have the effect of adding 20 per cent to Orlando’s sewagetreatment capacity. This will buy him time to pursue two major projects: -By next summer, the city will begin work on a pipeline from the new sewage plant to the airport. There, he said, “wastewater better than the water Miami drinks” will be injected down a 600-foot well into the Floridan Aquifer, replenishing the state’s main source of water. THE ENTIRE $ 80-million project will be financed with sewer hook-up fees, he said. The fee for a single-family home has been increased from $l2O two years ago to $1,400. In Orange County, it is $1,600. -By next fall, the city and county expect to start building another wastewater pipeline from other plants into the orange groves. The wastewater, treated to kill all bacteria and viruses, will be used to irrigate the orange trees and recharge the watertable. The city and county already have signed up enough citrus growers for the first phase of the SIOO million EPA-financed project, Haven said.

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Clinton Township-Sandra O’Hair, a Republican. Madison Township-Shirley Brattain, a Democrat. Russell Township-Andrea Wertz, a Democrat. Greencastle Township-Joseph Ward, a Republican. MARION TOWNSHIP-Michael Robinson, a Republican. Cloverdale Township-Paul Fagin, a Democrat. Warren Township-Jean Cromwell, a Democrat. Franklin Township-Earl Bridges, a Democrat.

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met during 1982. THESE ASSOCIATIONS have been good theraphy and have made it easier to keep plugging along at times when not everything was going well. Encouraging letters, phone calls and personal comments have made for a rewarding year. Putnam Patter will be entering its 10th year in 1983, so perhaps it’s understandable if I become repetitious. My memory apparatus is subject to malfunctions now and then.

Cummins offering list of area support groups

The Education Committee of the Hendricks County Mental Health Association and the Community Services Department of Cummins Mental Health Center Inc. have compiled a list of names, phone numbers of self-help and peer support groups. This list will be used as resource by Cummins’ counselors and offered to anyone in

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ERIC SCHOENFELD Student of the Week

DePauw film series set

A Winter Term film series has been announced by DePauw University. All screenings will be held in the Julian Mathematics and Science Center auditorium. Admission will besl. THE SCHEDULE, as announced by Gordon Walters of the Romance Languages Department, is as follows: -Tuesday, Jan. 4, “Shampoo.” starring Warren Beatty, Julie Christie and Goldie Hawn (1975). -Wednesday, Jan. 5, “The 400 Blows” by Truffaut. French with subtitles (1959). -THURSDAY, Jan 6,

Thursday's total lunar eclipse last visible until 'B9 By PAULRAEBURN AP Science Writer NEW YORK (AP) The moon may turn the color of a sunset early Thursday as it enters the Earth's shadow in the last total lunar eclipse to be visible across America until 1989. astronomers say. During the half-hour eclipse, the moon could glow with a soft reddish or copper color because of light scattered from volcanic ash in the atmosphere, said William Gutsch, chairman of the Hayden Planetarium at the American Museum of Natural History in New York. The moon will enter Earth’s shadow at 4:50 a.m. EST, and the total eclipse will begin at 5:58 a m. EST and end at 6:59 a.m. EST. The eclipse, which will be visible across the country, is the third lunar eclipse this year The next total lunar eclipse to be visible from most of the United States will occur on August 16, 1989. A lunar eclipse will be visible from California on April 24, 1986. Although no one can be positive that the moon will be colored during the eclipse, Gutsch explained in a telephone interview Tuesday that the atmosphere “tends to scatter out the blue and the violet and allow the reds and yellows and oranges to get through.” “We see this commonly in the sunset, the reason being that we're seeing the sun through more and more atmosphere as it sets,” he said. During the last total lunar eclipse in July, the moon's north pole appeared darker than its south pole, Gutsch said, probably because of the eruption of Mexico's El Chichon volcano in April. Most of the ash released by that volcano is circulating in the Northern Hemisphere, Gutsch said, and the ash apparently blocked most scattered light that could have illuminated the moon’s northern portion. No special precautions are needed to watch the eclipse, which will occur in the western sky. It is safe to stare at a lunar eclipse, unlike a solar eclipse where it is possible to permanently damage the eyes by watching without special protective glasses. The Hayden Planetarium advises eclipse watchers to take along a pair of binoculars.

the community who is interested. A self-help group is a group of persons who share a common problem and work together to cope with that problem through mutual support and the sharing of information and resources. For a copy of this list, persons may contact Margaret Trauner, volunteer coordinator of Cummins Mental Health Center Inc., at 745-4711.

Schoenfeld tabbed Student of Week

Eric Schoenfeld, a senior in Greencastle High School and son of Lee and Sue Schoenfeld, 200 Edglea Drive, was named Student of the Week when the Optimist Club met Tuesday at the Elks. On the cumulative honor roll, he is listed in Who’s Who Among American High School Students and is a member of the National Honor Society, serving as vice president. AMONG HIS activities are Student Council and Spanish, G and Computer clubs as well as the Key Club of which he is

“Bicycle Thief." Italian with subtitles (1948). -Tuesday, Jan. 11, “The Postman Always Rings Twice,” starring Lana Turner and John Garfield (1945). -Wednesday, Jan. 12. “Putney Swope,” an American satire of “sacred cows,” directed by Robert Downey (1969). -THURSDAY, Jan. 13, "Knife in the Water” by Roman Polanski. Polish with subtitles (1962). -Tuesday, Jan. 18, “M.” starring Peter Lorre. German with subtitles (1940). --Wednesday, Jan. 19,

Correction Notice HAPPY NEW YEAR! t\ Holiday Hours: Our facilities, including drive-through service, will close at 3 p. m. FRIDAYJ)EC.3I,I9B2 Reopen 9 a.m. Monday, January 3,1983 CENTRAL NATIONAL BANK FIRST CITIZENS BANK AND TRUST CO. GREENCASTLE FEDERAL SAVINGS AND LOAN "We wish you a safe and very happy holiday season/'

president. The student’s hobbies include camping, fishing, hunting, trapping and sports. Lettering three years in football, he was named all conference and all county in 1982. In golf, he was named all conference in 1982 and lettered three years in this sport. Other letter sports include wrestling and swimming. Following graduation next spring, he plans to major in computer science in either Wooster, Wittenberg or DePauw universities.

“Notorious” by Alfred Hitchcock. Starring Cary Grant, Claude Rains and Ingrid Bergman (1946). -THURSDAY, Jan. 20, “Alexander Nevsky” by Eisenstein. Russian with subtitles (1938). --Tuesday, Jan. 25, “Masculine/Feminine” by Godard. French with subtitles. (1965). -Wednesday, Jan. 26. “Women in the Dunes.” Japanese with subtitles. (1959). -THURSDAY, Jan. 27, “The Wild Bunch.” by Sam Peckinpah. Starring William Holden and Ernest Borgnine (1969).

J ’4 m Time's running out to let you Is appreciate your patronage.

We will close at 2 p.m. Fri., Dec. 31 and will be closed all day New Year’s Day. We will be open regular hours Sun., Jan. 2.

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24 NORTH JACKSON, GREENCASTLE

Putnam scanner Greencastle Fire Dept. An estimate $2,000 damage was sustained by a Pingleton Lumber Co., 487 First St., Greencastle. shed and equipment as a result of a Tuesday morning fire. A shed which houses a debarker and hydraulic lines and power cables servicing the machinery were damaged, firemen said. Two trucks, a tanker and a utility truck carrying additional manpower, were needed to extinguish the fire which began in a pile of wood bark located adjacent to a debarking machine. The department dispatched the first of the two trucks at 5:49 a.m. and the second truck was called to the scene at 7:05. Firemen believe sparks from a cutting torch started the fire. After using 3,000 gallons of water to extinguish the fire, both crews of firemen returned to the station at 10:53 a.m. Correction Due to the juxtaposition of lines of type in yesterday’s edition, a quote from Glen Walters, who announced his candidacy for Greencastle mayor on the Democrat primary ballot, was misrepresented. The quote should have read: “I think it is a disgrace that our City Hall is in a condemned building and we spend almost $8 million to flush our toilet stools.”

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