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Dundee council weighs allowing a single extraterritorial sewer hookup; staff outlines five options
Summary
Council heard a staff report laying out five options for a property outside city limits seeking connection to city sewer — from doing nothing to annexation or UGB expansion — and directed staff to explore a narrow ordinance or expedited path after the owner offered to cover initial study costs.
City staff presented five pathways for a property owner who asked to connect a home outside Dundee’s city limits to the municipal sanitary sewer: maintain the current Title 13 prohibition; amend Title 13 to allow limited extraterritorial sanitary sewer extensions (staff estimated 60–70 hours and roughly $10,000–$14,000 in staff/legal costs); annexation (not feasible for this parcel); an Urban Growth Boundary (UGB) expansion (applicant-initiated or city-initiated; $50,000–$100,000+); or an urban reserve designation (long, costly process estimated $50,000–$150,000).
Staff stressed issues to evaluate if the council allows extraterritorial connections: system development charges, monthly rate structure (often higher outside city limits), wastewater treatment plant capacity, public-health and septic regulation interplay, invert elevations and constructability, and intergovernmental coordination with the county.
The property owner told council the request is a convenience for a single house, said the sewer main is nearby and offered to pay initial fees and hook-up costs (he indicated a willingness to cover about $10,000–$25,000 depending on actual charges). Councilors expressed sympathy and frustration that a nearby home could be denied hookup by ordinance, but also raised resource constraints. Several council members said they preferred option 2 (an ordinance to allow limited extraterritorial hookups with strict limits) provided staff workload and budget impacts are addressed.
The council did not adopt an ordinance at the meeting. Instead, the mayor asked to meet with the interim administrator and city attorney to explore whether a narrowly tailored, time-limited ordinance or a funded staff analysis could be completed in a reasonable timeframe that protects the city and avoids opening an unbounded precedent.
What’s next: Staff will report back on whether the city can fund or accept applicant funding for the code amendment review and will outline a timeline and proposed safeguards for a narrowly scoped ordinance if feasible.
