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Trenton council approves water hookup for proposed hay press while urging caution on broader growth
Summary
Amid concerns about limited water supplies and incomplete monitoring data, the town council approved a water hookup for a proposed hay-press business and urged officials to wait for a full impact study before expanding residential hookups or commercial allocations.
At the meeting, council members approved a water hookup for a proposed hay-press business after a lengthy public discussion about the town’s limited water supply and pending studies.
Speakers pressed for data and caution. One council participant (Speaker 1) said the town lacks enough information to expand hookups broadly, warning: "If we let everybody keep watering the way they are, we don't have enough water." Speaker 7 said monitoring shows the system is currently "spilling about, what, 70 k's" — roughly 60,000–80,000 gallons per day — a figure the council treated as approximate and seasonal.
The applicant (Speaker 4) said the hay-press would limit municipal water use to restrooms, plan to bring supplemental water for equipment washing, and avoid water-intensive "cubing." Council members questioned fire protection, noise, and additional truck traffic; the applicant estimated roughly 100 trucks per month for initial throughput (about 30,000 tons annually), or roughly 25 truck trips per week.
After discussion, the council moved and voted to approve a water hookup for the business. The transcript records a voice vote and the chair declaring, "It passes." The motion record does not list a mover, seconder, or a roll-call tally in the transcript; no formal conditions beyond the stated operational limits were recorded in the meeting transcript.
Councilors emphasized that broader policy decisions about prioritizing commercial hookups over residential ones will await the town’s impact study and the next year of hydrologic data. Officials said an impact study and a new water master plan are due to conclude late this year or early next year; the council intends to review the findings and revisit hookup policy and ordinance changes in light of that evidence.
Next steps: the council directed staff to continue the impact-study work, gather data from neighboring jurisdictions and engineers, and return with findings that can inform any change to the ordinance governing hookups.
