Agency seeks autonomous water supply for westside

The Tualatin Valley Water District fights to end its dependence on Portland's Bull Run system

Monday, September 13, 1999

By R. Gregory Nokes of The Oregonian staff

Taking control of their own water destiny, while dethroning Portland as the region's unrivaled water power broker, has become a primary goal of Washington County water agencies that advocate a Willamette River water treatment plant.

None has pushed harder or longer for the Willamette River than the Beaverton-based Tualatin Valley Water District. It has the most to gain, even though the district has no plans to use the water for at least the next couple of decades, if then.

"A lot of it had to do with the district not wanting to be a parasite of Portland," Tualatin Valley board President Jim Duggan said of efforts to tap the Willamette. "We need to develop as many sources as possible, so we are not totally dependent on Portland."

Officials in Tigard and Wilsonville also cite local control as among their key objectives in developing a Willamette source, even though Tigard residents put it last on their list of seven water goals in a 1998 poll conducted by Davis & Hibbitts Inc.

Tigard and Wilsonville voters will decide Sept. 21 whether to support the decisions of their city councils to help build a $92 million state-of-the-art water treatment plant on the Willamette to supply their future water needs. Tigard voters are considering whether they want the right to veto a Willamette source. Wilsonville voters are being asked to endorse a $25 million revenue bond for their city's share of building the plant.

Tualatin Valley Water District has agreed to contribute $16.2 million and has the water right most of the others would use. Tualatin and Sherwood may also join in. Wilsonville has its own water right -- and a treatment plant site already picked out on the north bank of the river, about a half-mile west of Interstate 5.

Willamette proponents make three primary arguments:

•• Treated water will be safe.

•• The region needs a major alternative in the event of a disruption in Portland's Bull Run system on which much of the region has long relied.

•• A Willamette supply will cost less than obtaining more water from the Bull Run.

But not inconsequential are bruised feelings from past heavyhanded behavior by Portland.

Duggan said, for example, that former Mayor Frank Ivancie once dropped a proposed contract in front of his Beaverton counterpart, demanding "Take it or leave it." Beaverton left it and switched from the Bull Run to the Trask and Tualatin rivers.

Portland City Commissioner Erik Sten concedes that Portland has been guilty of arrogance. But he insists that this and the other arguments are a smoke screen to disguise the district's real desire to become the primary provider to the west side. "They want to build a Willamette plant, and every argument is used to that effect," he said.

Both water agencies deny seeing the other as a competitor, but the ingredients for a rivalry are firmly in place: Tualatin Valley is the region's second-largest water agency, serving 150,000 residents in fast-growing Washington County. The Portland Water Bureau serves a more static population of 800,000, much of it in Portland and Multnomah County.

There's little disagreement that Portland offers superior water. Tualatin Valley buys 80 percent of its water from Bull Run and 20 percent from the Trask and Tualatin rivers.

"Bull Run has the best-quality water," Jesse Lowman, former general manager, said in an interview before his retirement. "Part of our water will always come from Bull Run."

Opportunity to win long campaign

But it was Lowman who told the Tualatin Valley board in July that a Willamette treatment plan offers "a window of opportunity to solidify Tualatin Valley Water District's role as a leader in the industry in this area."

-RTTualatin Valley Water District has campaigned most of this decade for a Willamette option. It has paid for testing aimed at show-ing that treated water will be safe to drink, despite the river's long history of pollution.

It's not been an easy campaign. The district came close to winning a regionwide endorsement of a Willamette option in 1995 but ran into vetoes from the Portland City Council and Metro.

Lowman said the district wouldn't be as close as it is now if Tigard hadn't come forward at a key moment in 1997 to offer to use the water. He said the Oregon Water Resourdes Department had warned Tualatin Valley it could lose its 26-year-old application for a water right of 130 million gallons a day if it didn't use it soon.

"Five years ago," Lowman said, "we started looking for a partner."

Among Tualatin Valley's challenges has been to convince people that the treated water would be equal to or exceed the safe drinking water standards of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

The job fell to Kevin Hanway, a former lobbyist Tualatin Valley Water District hired in 1996. He helped organize a group called the Willamette Water Supply Agency, a collection of a half-dozen water districts interested in the Willamette. Hanway had no illusions that his job would be easy.

"We knew the perception of the Willamette was bad," Hanway said. "We had to help communicate to the public why their perceptions weren't accurate on the basis of the research. We had to get the public to move beyond a knee-jerk response to looking at the research data."

His tactics haven't always pleased Portland.

Sten, who is in charge of the Portland Water Bureau, fumes over press releases referring to the Bull Run system as "Portland's Columbia South Shore Wellfield/Bull Runsystem, even though the wells are rarely used. "That's a Hanway creation," he said. "All the negative reasons to smear the wellfields, to smear Portland's reputation, is really unfortunate. I think it serves them well."

Besides, Sten said, "I wouldn't be denigrating our system so much because if they lose (on Sept. 21), they'll be over here trying to get some water."

Hanway also commissioned a $15,000 study to answer critics who alleged that treated Willamette water might contain "endocrine disrupters" that could be linked to cancer and might damage reproductive systems in women.

"The research came back, and they couldn't detect any endocrine disrupter activity, and there were not reasons to pursue it further," Hanway said. Testing proves treated Willamette water would be "comparable in quality" to the Bull Run system, he said.

Critics don't seriously question that treated water would meet federal standards. They aim their criticism at the possibility that the federal standards are inadequate and that there might be unknown pollutants the standards fail to address.

Plant-building candidate

Hanway left the district in August to join Montgomery Watson Americas Inc., a consulting firm that has conducted tests of Willamette's water quality under contract with the Tualatin Valley district. The firm also has done preliminary design work for a treatment plant, making it an obvious candidate to build the plant if voters give the go-ahead.

If voters approve, Lowman said, a treatment plant could be up and running in three years. "If the vote is 'No' for drinking it, I think it kills it. If we don't have a customer, there is no reason for us to build it."

If a Willamette plant is built, Sten said, Tualatin Valley might not get as much Bull Run water as it wants. Negotiations are under way on new long-term contracts for Tualatin Valley and the other jurisdictions that buy Portland water.

"I'm not making threats," Sten, said. "(But) if they think the Willamette is a better source, I'm not sure it's our job to make sure they, get all the Bull Run water they want."

Tualatin Valley officials hope just the opposite: that development of a Willamette source will give them greater leverage in negotiating a more favorable contract with Portland.

Duggan, the TVWD board president, suggested any talk that Portland might deny water to some customers was just that - talk. Portland will need all the water customers it can get to help pay for needed improvements in the Bull Run system, Duggan said, possibly to include a filtration plant and a third dam.

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