News comes as Public Utilities director presents ‘State of Utility’ report to County Commission
Sarasota County staff’s conversion of the county’s largest wastewater treatment plant — the Bee Ridge Water Reclamation Facility (WRF) — to Advanced Wastewater Treatment status and the expansion of the plant’s capacity has won the Envision Gold Award from the Institute of Sustainable Infrastructure.
That was part of a State of the Utility presentation to the County Commission that Public Utilities Department Director Brooke Bailey made on Nov. 19, as part of the regular meeting that day in Venice.
The work on the facility, she pointed out, is “our largest capital project right now.”
Bailey noted that the Envision distinction is akin to LEED certification for environmentally sustainable construction.
Moreover, she pointed out, “We are actually the first wastewater facility in the state of Florida to receive this [honor], and for it to be one of our largest projects definitely is a testament to staff.”
She began her presentation that day by telling the board members she was speaking on behalf of the department’s 270 employees.
Bailey also noted that part of the Bee Ridge WRF project has entailed implementation of what is called a “membrane bioreactor treatment process” (MBR).
The Environmental Protection Agency explains that use of the MBR technology has become more common, largely because of the membranes’ higher efficiency in removing “contaminants such as nitrogen, phosphorus, bacteria … and total suspended solids.”
The Bee Ridge WRF will be one of the largest MBR facilities in the state, Bailey added. That fact has been drawing a number of people to Sarasota County to see the process in action, she said.
During her remarks, Bailey also presented a short video that had been created by a former intern with Public Utilities who has become a full-time employee of the department, Lin Jin. The video shows how the Bee Ridge MBR process works.
It is one of a number of videos that Lin has been working on for use in educating the public, Bailey said.
In regard to the county’s wastewater treatment systems in general, Bailey showed the board members a slide with various data. Among them are the facts that the county has 91,600 wastewater accounts, 560 miles of sewer force main, 19,800 manholes and 777 lift stations. (The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) explains, “Force mains are pipelines that convey wastewater under pressure from the discharge side of a pump or pneumatic ejector to a discharge point. Pumps or compressors located in a lift station provide the energy for wastewater conveyance in force mains.”)
Over the last five years,” Bailey said, the number of wastewater accounts has grown by 8.5%; the annual rate is about 2.2%.
Along with the Bee Ridge WRF, she continued, the county’s water reclamation facilities are Venice Gardens, which stands at 375 Venice E. Blvd. in Venice; and the Central County WRF, which is located on Palmer Ranch.
The next big project, she reminded the commissioners, will be the conversion of the Venice Gardens WRF to Advanced Wastewater Treatment status and doubling its capacity, which is 3 million gallons per day, a county staff memo pointed out.
That initiative is expected to begin in March 2025, Bailey said, with completion anticipated in December 2027.
She thanked the commissioners for approving a total of $18.8 million out of the funds that the county received through the American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) to help pay for the Venice Gardens project.
Just that morning, she noted, the board members had approved the addition of $8.8 million out of the ARPA money to go with $10 million in those funds already allocated to the initiative.
The water report
At the outset of her presentation, Bailey focused on the county’s potable water system.
The county has 104,100 water accounts, a slide showed, along with three treatment plants; 1,430 miles of pipe; seven pump stations; 30 wells; and 7,860 hydrants.
The three facilities are the University Parkway Wellfield and plant, the T. Mabry Carlton Jr. plant, and the Venice Gardens plant, a map pointed out.
“Since [2022],” she told the board members, “we’ve actually been considered a very large system,” as defined by the American Water Works Association.
The number of accounts is growing at a rate of 2% a year, Bailey added.
The county met all potable water standards in 2023, she continued, with no violations recorded.
Bailey also noted that the county Communications Department staff designed a new Consumer Confidence Report for the water system, which debuted earlier this year with the 2023 data. The biggest facet of that report, she explained, is its focus on staff’s sampling for a wide variety of chemicals. Even the “non detect” data was included in the 2023 report, she added.
Then Bailey turned to water consumption. “We did see a little bit of an uptick in [2023],” she noted, as the year was drier.
A slide said that, in Sarasota County, water consumption per person went from 81 gallons per day in 2022 to 86 per day in 2023. In Manatee County, for comparison purposes, the rate was 81 gallons per day in 2022, as well, but 83 in 2023.
“We do have some seasonality with our customers, so it will bring our average down,” Bailey pointed out.
Another slide provided data about water supply capacity changes, with the number of available gallons per day projected to be 39.06 million by 2033. (The county’s contract for water purchases from Manatee County will end in 2028, Mike Mylett, the former Public Utilities director, told the board members before he retired last year). The largest portion of the county’s potable water in the future will continue to come from the Peace River Manasota Regional Water Supply Authority, with the rest — 12 million gallons a day (mgd) — from the Carlton Water Treatment Plant.
Thanks to the commission’s agreement earlier this year to support the Peace River Authority’s plans for a regional surface water treatment project, Bailey said, “We’re really set for the next 20 years on water supply.”
She also reminded the board members about the two-phase undertaking to double the Carlton’s capacity from 6 mgd; that was completed in November 2023.
Further, Bailey reported that staff recently had kicked off an initiative involving a third party that will convert the county’s water meters to a system that will connect them to a cellular network. It is called the Advance Metering Infrastructure Replacement Program (AMI), a slide said. After its completion, Bailey explained, staff will receive continuous data from the meters. “We can see leaks in real time,” she added of the system.
In fact, she continued, after Hurricane Milton hit the county, staff was able to use the AMI technology on Siesta Key, with staff already having replaced the meters on the island because they were failing faster than meters in other county locations.
“Because we had that data,” she said, “when we brought the Key back up after Milton, we were actually able to see which facilities had leaks on their side …”
For example, Bailey pointed out, a meter “moving very rapidly around 2 o’clock in the morning” indicates a problem. Staff was able to shut off problematic meters until damage could be repaired, she indicated.
“Super excited about getting this [system] throughout the rest of the county,” she added.
A slide said the completion of the project is expected in the 2029 fiscal year.
The CMOM program
Turning to another part of the update, Bailey told the board members that what is known as the “CMOM Program” is in its fifth year in the county. It evaluates the integrity of the sanitary sewer system for inflow and infiltration, she added.
(“CMOM” stands for capacity, management, operation and maintenance, the county website explains.)
“During the past storms, especially [Tropical Storm] Debby,” Bailey said, “we’ve talked quite a bit about inflow and infiltration … We saw our [sewage] flows double to our treatment facilities.” The lift stations sent the effluent, plus rainfall, to the plants, she continued, where those facilities had to contend with the extra fluid.
Staff has been pursuing a lot of “smoke testing,” she said, to find cracks where water could flow into the pipes. Closed-circuit TV (CCTV) inspections also have been pursued, she noted.
A slide reported that smoke testing had been conducted on 862,570 linear feet of pipes, with the CCTV work involving another 732,817 linear feet.
“We’ve done a really good snapshot of 25% to 30% of our system,” she pointed out, “and now we know where to make repairs.”
Another slide noted that, from the 2016 fiscal year through the 2023 fiscal year, the county spent $28.6 million to line 126 miles of the sanitary sewer system in an effort to prevent inflow and infiltration, along with the rehabilitation of 150 manholes. The slide also said that the expense over the same period to rehabilitate 240 lift stations was $27.2 million.
The focus, Bailey added, has been on the lift stations and manholes put in place before 2001. About 47% of those lift stations have been rehabilitated, she said, along with 68% of the manholes.
Another $17 million is scheduled to be spent from the 2024 fiscal year, which ended on Sept. 30, through the 2028 fiscal year on the lining of the sewer pipelines and manhole rehabilitation, with $19 million budgeted for the lift station rehab.
Commissioner Ron Cutsinger took the opportunity to commend Bailey and her colleagues for “an exceptional job with getting lift stations back online after the hurricanes.”
He also expressed appreciation for the hiring of the former intern, Lin Jin. “Best of luck to her,” Cutsinger said.
Higher and higher costs
Among other details in her report, Bailey addressed rising expenses for her department.
Although construction costs have risen over recent years, she noted, the “biggest hit” has been in the price of chemicals, “which we use daily.”
The price of one chemical has risen 300%, she pointed out, while others have climbed 100%.
A slide compared department expenses in the 2023 and 2024 fiscal years, with projections included for the 2025 through 2028 fiscal years.
However, Bailey said, “As we’re rebidding [contracts], we’re starting to see some of [the prices] come down a little bit.”
Bailey also showed the commissioners a slide that compared the average residential water/wastewater bill for use of 4,000 gallons a day in Sarasota County — $102.62 — to the rates in surrounding communities.
The slide noted that the average bill, based on the survey, was $89.70. Pinellas County had the lowest figure, while Charlotte County had the highest.