County Commissioner Eric Fiori says the situation facing water and sewer treatment facilities in northern Worcester County is an emergency. A better description is DISASTER.

So... what is this emergency Fiori is intent on fixing? Essentially, it involves about 11 sewer and water districts in the northern area of the county. These include Ocean Pines, Glenn Riddle, Mystic Harbor, The Landings, Newark, Assateague Point and others in the Route 611 corridor below West Ocean City.

A number of these water and sewer districts are not collecting enough ratepayer fees to cover the cost of operating the facility. County law requires each water and sewer treatment district to be self-sustaining with all costs paid by users in the district.

Many of the problems are in Fiori's County Commissioner District. Fiori is reported saying, "I think we need to create a task force, because in my opinion, we're in an emergency, especially in the Mystic Harbor, Glenn Riddle sewer districts in particular. We're losing so much money. I myself would never vote for an increase in water-sewer costs. These ideas need commissioner buy-in. We can't function like this."

The Commissioners created a task force consisting of Eric Fiori, Jim Bunting, and Ted Elder.  OPA members can rest assured Bunting will look after our interests. Bunting has long been a friend to Ocean Pines and is one of the finest individuals to ever hold a seat on the Worcester County Commissioners.

As an aside, the County is likely to also connect River Run sewage to Ocean Pines even though it has its own sewage treatment facility utilizing spray irrigation. Will any spray irrigation area become eligible for development as a result?

Last fall seven service areas in northern Worcester had an operating shortfall of around $2 million. To keep the sewage treatment in operation the County Commissioners, loathe to increase rates, decided to take $9.5 million of tax payer funds and LOAN it to various water and sewage treatment service areas. $9.5 million sounds like a disaster.

A major loan recipient has to be Glen Riddle. It's water and sewage system has not functioned properly for about four years and it is not likely to be fixed for another two or three years!

Meantime, untreated sewage is trucked from Glen Riddle to the Ocean Pines plant for treatment. Glen Riddle has also been using a substantial quantity of water from the Ocean Pines area, to the detriment of rate payers in the Ocean Pines area.

With Fiori saying, "I myself would never vote for an increase in water-sewer costs," how will Worcester County taxpayers recover the $9.2 million the Commissioners loaned to some water and sewer service areas?

However, the $9.2 million may be only the tip of the iceberg. There are also capital budget proposals for the various water and sewer districts that will cost over $51 million. How does Fiori propose to not increase water and sewer rates and recover over $60 million in loans and new capital projects?

On top of all this, apparently the County is also considering consolidation of 11 different water and sewer districts into a forced sewer main system that could take years to complete at a very high cost.

The entire situation raises many questions, especially for rate payers in Ocean Pines. Let's face it, when it comes to water and sewer in northern Worcester County, the Ocean Pines facility is the "Two-million Gallon Gorilla." Nothing else compares to it.

Consider this -- the Ocean Pines sewage treatment plant has a capacity to treat two million gallons of sewage a day. About 20 years ago when the plant was expanded to its current capacity, the then Worcester County Director of Public Works insisted at a public hearing that the proposed capacity increase was needed "only" for the subdivision of Ocean Pines.

That turned out to be provably wrong. Two years ago, the retiring Assistant Director confirmed the actual peak flow from the plant was only one million gallons per day over a beautiful Fourth of July weekend, the weekend that always produces more sewage flow to the plant than any other days of the year.

In other words, the plant was running at half capacity during the period of peak use.

In theory, thousands of additional connections, so-called EDUs, could be added to the Ocean Pines service area. The original Boise Cascade sewage discharge permit was maxed at three million gallons a day. If still in effect, and approved by the State of Maryland, this could add even more thousands of connections.

Again, in theory, the Ocean Pines sewer service area might well handle the needs of all 11 current service areas.

Possible? Probable? Who knows. When it comes to one of the most valuable commodities in Worcester County - sewer connections - anything is possible.

Glen Riddle cannot handle it own needs for water and sewer, and that facility also provides water and sewer to the commercial operations across Route 50 like Walmart, Home Depot, and McDonalds. On the drawing board are a new Giant supermarket and apartment complex to the west of those businesses.

Riddle Farms cannot handle any additional water and sewer connections. Make book that these new commercial developments along Route 50 will be hooked up to the Ocean Pines sewage treatment plant. The County already is proposing a sewer treatment line connection from Ocean Pines to Glen Riddle at a cost of $3.2 million. Will Ocean Pines ratepayers be forced to pay for any of that cost? So many questions. Too few answers.

Once that connector line is in place, the Ocean Pines plant can receive raw sewage for treatment from all across the northern end of Worcester County. In fact, the County is proposing a line from the Mystic Harbor area to Glen Riddle for the purpose of providing treated effluent that Glen Riddle can use for spray irrigation on their golf courses. The same line could probably be used to transport untreated sewage to the Ocean Pines plant in the future.

Twenty or so years ago, the County spent a great deal of money to run a water line connection from the Ocean Pines service area to Glen Riddle. If memory is correct, the cost was split evenly between the two areas, on the premise each could supply water to the other in the event of an emergency. Ridiculous. Glen Riddle cannot even handle it own water requirements. Rate payers in Ocean Pines paid to provide needed additional water service to Glen Riddle.

Let's face it - Worcester County owns the water and sewage service facilities in the Ocean Pines subdivision and can pretty much do as it likes. However, ratepayers in Ocean Pines should not be subsidizing other areas to keep their rates low.

Who is watching the store for OPA ratepayers to prevent them from being ripped off? Up until now, no one. There is a County service area council, created decades ago solely for the purpose of protecting the interests of Ocean Pines ratepayers. Good luck trying to find out when this group meets or minutes of their meetings on the Worcester County website. As a practical matter the group is useless.

Fortunately, OPA board member Elaine Brady is now determined to get the Board of Directors involved to look out for the interests of OPA association members. This is welcome news.