Lebanon committee refines technical scoring and reviews 20 candidate sites for new wastewater plant

The Lebanon Water Reclamation Facility Site Selection Committee on Wednesday moved to clarify the technical scoring matrix it will use to shortlist sites for a new wastewater treatment plant and heard an engineer present standardized layouts and cost estimates for 20 candidate properties.

Steve Jones, identified in the meeting as a non‑voting member who prepared the evaluation materials, told the panel he applied the same oxidation‑ditch/clarifier footprint to every parcel to enable direct comparison. "We took the same layout and put it on every site," Jones said, explaining the approach is intended to allow "apples to apples" scoring across differing land parcels.

That process produced widely varying conveyance estimates: Site 2 was presented as the closest to existing effluent mains (about 500 linear feet, roughly $500,000), while sites farther from mains could require thousands of feet of new pipe — Site 7 was estimated at roughly 28,000 linear feet (conveyance cost quoted at about $28 million). Jones flagged other cost drivers including roadway upgrades, three‑phase power and gas extensions, floodplain mitigation and, for some industrial parcels, potential brownfield remediation.

Committee members debated how narrowly to define scoring terms. Members urged short, written definitions for matrix categories such as "community impact," "service efficiency" and "environmental permitting" to reduce variation in individual scores. Several members and staff recommended that detailed endangered‑species and geotechnical vetting be reserved for a later phase after the committee narrows the list.

Examples from the engineer's presentation included:
• Site 1: adequate acreage but about 8,000 linear feet of transmission piping to connect to effluent lines (presenter estimated conveyance cost about $8 million).
• Site 2: ~66 acres with minimal floodplain and a short tie‑in (about $500,000 estimated).
• Site 6: large track (~223 acres) with low residential impact but potentially ~10,000 feet of piping (~$10 million estimate).
• Site 12: a larger property (~356 acres) with lower flood impact but ~$14 million in conveyance costs.
• Site 16: adjacent to the existing plant; notable acquisition cost question — an appraisal figure of about $29 million for one nearby parcel was cited.

Jones told the group that definitive environmental and acquisition work would follow once a shortened list of sites is agreed. The committee reiterated that its charge is technical evaluation; land acquisition and any condemnation decisions would be handled later by the City Council and city staff.

Next steps: members asked participants to review the matrix and materials and return prepared to eliminate lower‑ranked sites; the committee discussed meeting again the week of the 15th to continue shortlisting work.