Flathead Lake MATTERS: How the Bigfork Water and Sewer District protects water quality

By DAVID REESE

Bigfork Eagle

The next time you turn on your faucet or flush the toilet, think about where that water is going.

If you live in or around Bigfork, that water is going through a state-of-the-art cleaning system. And then into Flathead Lake.

It’s Julie Spencer’s job to make sure that the water being returned to Flathead Lake is as drinkable and as pure as when it came out. Spencer is manager of the Bigfork Water and Sewer District, which services people around Bigfork, from Flathead Lake Lodge to the south, out to Ferndale to the east, the Flathead River to the west, and the Catholic church to the north.

The Bigfork Water and Sewer District installed a new system in April 2012 that has greatly improved efficiency and cost. That facility is next to Montana 35, just below the new site of the Flathead Lake Brewing Company. The facility cost $8 million and was paid for using a Montana state government loan fund, plus state grants.

With Bigfork’s high rate of growth in the mid 2000s, it was time to upgrade its sewage treatment plant. “The old facility did a good job,” Spencer said. “It just wasn’t as good at removing as much nitrogen and phosphorus as we needed.”

The plant can process about one million gallons of wastewater a day. The former plant could handle 500,000 gallons. Bigfork’s facility treats about 300,000 gallons a day, and it peaks around July 4, when it will process over 400,000 gallons, Spencer said.

Those 400,000 gallons of water will be released into the Swan River, just below the Montana 35 bridge in Bigfork. From there, the effluent becomes part of Flathead Lake’s biology. The treatment plant removes suspended solids, coliform bacteria and biological compounds that deplete natural water of oxygen when the treated water is put in Flathead Lake.

And to Spencer, a native Montanan whose family homesteaded the Flathead Valley, protecting our water resource is important.

Outside the wastewater treatment plant, a small, dark-colored creek flows through concrete raceways into the plant. This is the all the water that’s being processed at any one time from all the flushing of toilets, brushing of teeth, shaving of faces and washing of dishes going on in homes and businesses around Bigfork.

From there this cocktail of wastewater is taken through aerobic and anaerobic processes, mixing and processing before aluminum sulfate is added. The alum attaches to the phosphorus in the water, which then precipitates out of solution to form solids. Phosphorus and nitrogen are two important molecules that must be reduced or removed from water before it enters Flathead Lake. Phosphorus and nitrogen contribute to algae growth, which is harmful to the biology of Flathead Lake.

The solid effluent that remains from the filtration is then piped into a tanker truck and taken to a farm just north of the green box dump site on Montana 82. The Bigfork Water and Sewer District owns 317 acres there, where the sewage sludge is land applied by farmer Dan Brosten. Brosten raises wheat, oats and barley on the land, and with the human fertilizer, he is very successful at having high yields on his crops. “The farm is incredible,” Spencer said. “It used to be an old, worn out farm.”

“The nutrients are good for the land, just bad for the water,” Spencer said. “We just put them where they are beneficial to use.”

Bigfork Water and Sewer District makes about $34,000 a year off of the lease payments from Brosten. That amount is based on net proceeds of the farm, Spencer said. The new plant has reduced Bigfork’s cost of alum, from $36,000 annually to about $9,000 annually.

Bigfork’s “membrane bio reactor” facility that was installed last year was the first one in Montana. The treatment plant was designed to handle growth and capacity in Bigfork for 20 years, including bringing Woods Bay online.

The Bigfork Sewer District has been around since 1963, when several visionary people had the foresight to create a sewer district that could install a wastewater treatment facility.

People used a red dye and poured it down their drains. When Bigfork Bay “became red,” it was apparent that Bigfork needed a wastewater treatment facility, Spencer said. “It was very farsighted of them to do this,” Spencer said. “It’s pretty unusual for an unincorporated town to have its own treatment 50 years ago.” It was also farsighted that Bigfork Water and Sewer District bought its own land to dispose of its solid waste. Bigfork’s 317 acres is more than all of Flathead County’s available acreage for solid waste disposal, Spencer said.

There remains more work in keeping water from local residents and businesses pure before it enters Flathead Lake.

Ferndale and Woods Bay, which have pockets of high residency, are all on septic systems. Getting them on Bigfork’s sewer lines is a challenge, because both of the areas are not incorporated, and Woods Bay is in Lake County. “It’s hard to get customers an assessment before they have an ability to hook up to sewer,” Spencer said. “I think they’d all like to have sewer, but they’d like to have affordable sewer.” The average residents who are connected to Bigfork Water and Sewer pay $52 a month.

Developments like Saddlehorn and the new Rising Mountains assisted-living facility have paid hefty prices to connect to Bigfork’s sewer system. Eagle Bend Golf Community had its own treatment facility up until 1995 when it decided to connect to Bigfork’s treatment plant.

Connecting communities that are currently on septic systems to Bigfork has its own consequences. Land-use regulations now regulate the number of homes on a Flathead Lake lot that use septic systems. If those lots connect to sewer, landowners can put more houses on a lot — which means more wastewater for the Bigfork treatment facility.

The Bigfork Sewer District took over the water supply side of the equation in 1993 when Pacific Power and Light got out of the business. Until then, Bigfork’s water supply came from a feed line off of the Swan River upstream of the powerhouse in Bigfork. The water supply had issues with contamination. The Bigfork Water and Sewer District now uses well water from two wells on land it owns north of Bigfork next to the U.S. Forest Service property. A third well is being installed this summer to help handle high irrigation demands in the summer. Bigfork’s main water supply is a 350,000-gallon buried tank in the Lake Hills area. The water-storage tank above Bigfork High School was built in 1963 and is used mainly for fire-protection backup, Spencer said. Saddlehorn development has two of its own wells.

Bigfork is required to operate on stringent effluent requirements limits because it discharges directly into Flathead Lake. Whitefish and Lakeside use lagoons to treat sewage. The wastewater is then sprayed on land.

“We have pretty significant limits here and we stay well below them,” Spencer said.