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Mill Valley adopts 2025–2034 sanitary sewer capital improvement plan; staff to pursue funding and rate analysis
Summary
The City Council approved a 10‑year sanitary sewer capital improvement plan that prioritizes CCTV inspections, repairs to 'hot spots,' pump station rehabilitation and flow monitoring; staff will complete a rate and fund study to identify user‑fee impacts.
The Mill Valley City Council voted June 16 to adopt a 2025–2034 Sanitary Sewer Capital Improvement Plan that outlines a decade of inspections, main rehabilitation and pump‑station upgrades to reduce inflow and infiltration and lower long‑term maintenance needs.
Public Works staff and Ben Schick of Schaff & Wheeler presented the plan, which inventoryed the city's sewer assets (56 miles of gravity mains, about 1,400 manholes, three pump stations) and recommended targeted rehabilitation where CCTV inspection and manhole data show deterioration, root intrusion, offset joints and other defects. Schick said existing CCTV coverage includes roughly 30% of the system in the last six years, older data covering another portion, and about 34% with limited or no inspection data.
Staff emphasized hot‑spot management: a matrix adopted with EPA guidance lets the city remove a location from the hot‑spot list once repairs or maintenance results demonstrate sustained improvement. The plan prioritizes annual CCTV inspections of approximately 10% of the gravity system plus ongoing manhole assessments, pump‑station rehabilitation (notably Frontage Road), and coordination with paving projects to avoid digging recently repaved streets.
City staff framed the plan as a multi-year, user‑funded program: the sewer program is supported by restricted user fees and the city has retained consultants (NBS Financial Consultants) to conduct a rate and fund study to determine impacts on rates and reserves. Staff described planning‑level figures (a multi‑year planning number in the low‑to‑mid‑tens of millions) but cautioned that engineering‑level designs and competitive procurement will refine costs.
Council members pressed for clarity on timing, inspection coverage, funding options, and potential rate changes; staff said no rate increase is scheduled this year and that the next steps include the financial analysis and targeted annual projects to reduce hot‑spot frequency.
By adopting the CIP, the council authorized staff to proceed with the program and associated studies required to bring projects to design and construction phases and to return with fiscal recommendations.
