June 08, 2004

(Updated) City Council Agrees To Not Bury Mt. Tabor Reservoirs

Will Accept Independent Panel's Majority Support For Risk Mitigation

Note: This post has been updated. Any and all updates appear at the end of the original post.

One of the longest-running stories of this site's 18 month history took a nearly 180-degree turn this morning, as the members of the Portland City Council expressed agreement with the majority opinion of a recently-concluded independent review process that the Mt. Tabor reservoirs should not be buried after all.

At the end of last month, the 13-member Mt. Tabor Independent Review Panel released its report, which presented the findings of an 8-member majority in favor of risk mitigation instead of burial, and a 5-member minority in favor of the City Council's original decision to bury Mt. Tabor's historic reservoirs.

Members of the panel presented their findings at a City Council work session this morning. Introducing the brief presentations, Commissioner Dan Saltzman provided a recap of the original decision to bury the reservoirs, the "what goes on top" design competition, and the general consensus (at this point) on the issue: "As everyone knows, it's been a controversial issue from the get-go." He praised the panel for narrowing the available options down to two, and said that while they failed to reach a final consensus, they "did conduct a very credible process."

Ogden Beeman, chair of the Independent Review Panel, explained what he saw as the challenges which faced the group: First, to be truly independent; second, to educate the members of the panel; third, to carry out a public process; fourth, to strike a balance between deliberation and public input; and fifth, to reach a decision. By his estimation, 20-25% of the panel's process was devoted to public input.

Sandra McDonough gave a summary of the majority report in favor of a risk mitigation option (see the previously-linked item on the panel's report and its findings). Amongst the factors McDonough said went into the majority's opinion were: a low risk of deliberate sabotage; vandalism is not expected to present a public health hazard; no state or federal requirements for open reservoirs to be closed or covered; and the fact that "cost was a very important consideration."

It is the majority's opinion, she said, that a "risk mitigation plan could be implemented at a much lower cost."

McDonough also said that the City had not investigated risk mitigation options at anything near the level at which it investigated the burial option. She encouraged the Council to convene a panel os experts and citizens to so investigate risk mitigation options. "More public process, I'm sorry," she said, prompting groaning laughs from the Council.

She explained that when it comes to various mitigation possibilities, "not all members of the majority" believe that fencing may be necessary at all, and that all eight members of the majority "strongly reject" the assertion that any setback around the reservoirs would need to be anywhere close to a suggested (by some) 100-feet.

McDonough also cited the need to address the "deferred maintenance" of the reservoirs, much of which has been put off because of the long-standing presumption that they would at some point simply be buried. She called the burial decision a "premature decision" driven by "an expectation that new federal regulations" would require it.

Tom Walsh spoke on behalf of the 5-member minority in favor of burial. To be honest, his defense of the minority opinion was no more persuasive or detailed than what is contained in the panel's report itself -- something we've remarked upon previously. It also appeared to be somewhat inconsistent. If we noted this correctly, he appeared to argue that burial would avoid the supposed $40 million cost of addressing deferred maintenance and possible seismic upgrades. But he went on to say that the supposed $80 million cost of burial would be a prudent investment.

Walsh also argued that burial would provide for increased security and reliability, but that the reservoirs' historic characteristics also should be preserved.

Commissioner Jim Francesconi asked for confirmation that the minority report "did not say that terrorism is grounds for burial." Walsh conceded the point: "The threat of terrorism is real, but small." He also said that such a threat would be systemwide and not limited to the Mt. Tabor reservoirs. Early in the controversial process surrounding this issue, protection from terrorist acts was one of the prime arguments used by proponents.

"That was the primary reason after 9/11, now it's birds," Francesocni quipped. Walsh replied by listing birds, vandalism, and the system's 100-year age as factors supporting a burial option.

Francesconi also pressed the panel members on the alleged $40 million figure for addressing deferred maintenance, asking if it was a firm number or in dispute.

"The water system is facing aging infrastructure that needs attention," McDonough said, also expressing concerns that without knowing for certain where possible new federal regulations are headed, it's difficult to know anything certain about possible costs. Asked by Francesconi if there was any data to determine maintenance costs, McDonough replied, "No."

Walsh took exception. "We have sufficient information identifying $40 million as the correct magnitude." In other words, when specifics are known, he expects the $30-40 million range to be more correct than a $15-20 million range.

Francesconi asked whether, in the balance of various other needs of the Water Bureau, if money needs to be spent on all of this now. "No," said Walsh. "But soon."

Representative Steve March reiterated the concerns over deferred maintenance. "There are pipes and valves that have not been replaced because of the assumption of burial," he said. But in terms of cost, "some of the numbers are in flux."

Francesconi also asked for confirmation that there had been consensus across the majority and minority members that historic preservation was important regardless of what direction would be taken on the reservoirs.

"There was extensive public process on how the park would look after burial," McDonough said. "A similar process is needed for a mitigation strategy."

Francesconi returned to the matter of time tables. "Why not wait until the federal rules?" he asked. "What's the harm in waiting?"

Walsh argued that the federal rules "were not the driving force in the minority report" and that the majority's risk mitigation option "has a high probability of not complying" with whatever the federal regulations turn out to be.

Beeman said that the draft regulations pre-date 9/11, and that the entire process of coming to final regulations could take several years -- and even when they are issued, they probably will be issued without specific guidelines as to how to comply. The bural option, he argued, would pre-empt all of that and almost certaintly be in compliance.

"Predicting when regulation is coming is dicey," McDonough said. Amongst other things, there is a chance the regulations will be "litigated by major cities." She also reiterated that it's important to take the time to "understand the full scope of how it impacts the full water system."

Francesconi asked if there currently is enough information to judge, if burial were the option, how long the City could wait before proceeding without it becoming prohibitively more expensive.

Walsh said a hypothetical wait of ten years could be done only with a high risk. "Must we start tomorrow?" he asked. "No." He said that he would suggest getting underway on a plan within six months, and the work itself in two to five years.

Commissioner Erik Sten remarked that while an 8-5 result is helpful, it's "not quite as helpful as unanimous." (One of the panel members joked that they tried to make it 7-6.) Sten wondered if there was no clear decision on whether or not the reservoirs will still be "open" forty years from now.

McDonough said that some of the majority members feel that eliminating the open reservoirs should be off the table permanently, while others feel it could be necessary at some point in the future. "But there's no compelling reason [for burial] at this time," she said.

March briefly referenced Philadelphia and its oen reservoirs and pointed out that "there is a variety of opinion" across the nation. He added: "No system is entirely vandal proof, or entirely terror proof."

Sten asked the majority members: "If the cost were equal, you'd still prefer this [current] system?"

March responded by pointing out that one problem with such questions is the lack of proper information. "Burial was looked at for thirty years," he said, "[while] mitigation was looked at for about a week."

Sten pushed again, asking if the majority members prefer the current system (and prefer risk mitigation) inherently, or because it would be cheaper than burial.

"In my view," said McDonough, "cost was a very important consideration."

Beeman interjected to say that the panel's technical advisor indicated that a risk mitigation plan would "require very large setbacks," and said that this matched a post-9/11 risk "assessment" done by the Water Bureau.

Walsh offered the reminder that "9/11 doesn't appear to be a factor on what to do or when to do it."

(These last two remarks may have been in response to a question or comment from Sten which we did not catch or make note of, rather than simply being out of left field as they appear to be here.)

Commissioner Saltzman's questions, at the outset, gave us the impression that he was once again going to come down on the side of his original burial decision. He first repeated that the panel had been unanimous in its rejection of every alternative before it (including the "do nothing" option) except for the option to bury the reservoirs and the risk mitigation option. He also underscored that some in the majority believe that burial could be (or become) appropriate in some circumstances.

McDonough described the majority's view on this: "Some say never, some say that regulation could take us there. But we don't know."

Saltzman asked if there was a setback amount beyond which the majority's opposition to burial might change.

March repeated the explanation that the majority had rejected the idea that a 100-foot setback would be required. "What you really want to know," March continued, "is when someone deliberately puts something in the system." In other words, what's important for the reservoirs is adequate monitoring.

"Monitoring and detection is the first thing that needs to happen," Beeman conceded. "But from [the moment of] detection, you can't shut off the valves rapidly {enough]."

Saltzman said there had been "some discussion about a hybrid approach" in which reservoir 6 would be buried, but risk mitigation applied to reservoirs 1 and 5.

McDonough replied that given currently-available information, there's no way to make a conclusion on that point. "There are issues unique to reservoir 6," she said. But she added that "degredation" there is not a health risk and water quality still meets to exceeds federal standards.

There was some discussion here about the eventual EPA rules, but we're not sure on the specifics. My notes regarding Saltzman's question read, in their entirety, "EPA rule -- everything at once." We're not sure what that means. McDonough's response was: "Problem is those are hypotheticals. It's too early for us to say."

Mayor Vera Katz asked jsut when the seismic issues come up, and who it was that introduced the matter.

McDonough said it was mentioned early on but only briefly and without detail. It came up again near the end of the panel's work. It turns out that this issue was rasied very mysteriously: "A member of the panel received an anonymous note that she should ask the question," McDonough said.

(Not long before the panel concluded its work, we received email from a reader about this seismic issue, and how it had suddenly been thrust into the conversation at the moment it was becoming increasingly clear that a majority of the panel liekly was heading to oppose burial. Clearly, someone was trying to get the panel to "stick to the plan" and come back around the supporting the burial option into which so much time, money, and attention had been invested.)

Katz then asked what Saltzman's timetable was at this point. Saltzman indicated that he wanted to bring the matter to Council by August at the latest, so it could consider what the next stpes should be. Saltzman said that once the City does have a risk mitigation plan before it, the Council should look not just at it, but again at burial as well.

Katz stressed that the process should continue to include public involvement. She also said it was important that the Council look at the rate increases that had been tied to the open reservoir replacement project, with the obvious likelihood that they would have to be rescinded if the City was going to defer any decisions until the eventual EPA regulations were finalized and released.

Francesconi concurred that this would be a necessary step, and also said that the Council would need to see something from the Water Bureau about its priorities. "Where does this fit in the range of needs," he said, "from terrorism to risk to maintenance."

Commissioner Randy Leonard commended Saltzman and pasued to "publicly acknowledge his integrity." On Saltzman's decision to at the very least (finally) defer burial, he said: "Glad he got there." Leonard also expressed his support for the need of the City and (in this case) the Water Bureau to prioritize its needs.

"I think Commissioner Saltzman went beyond where he thought we was going to be," said Katz.

With the general and information agreement reached that the Council would be headed towards an official acceptance of the panel's majority opinion, Saltzman reiterated that he expected to being a new resolution before Council no later than August, "charting a course from here to eternity."

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