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Moses Lake council tables two extraterritorial water requests over ERU limits and Department of Health constraints
Summary
Councilors tabled McAtee and Desert View extraterritorial applications after staff said the Larson pressure zone has zero available ERUs under Department of Health calculations and engineering constraints; staff and consultants will gather additional data and return for further consideration.
The Moses Lake City Council paused action on two linked extraterritorial agreement (ETA) applications that together requested 239 equivalent residential units (ERUs) in the Larson pressure zone, citing Department of Health (DOH) connection limits and hydraulic constraints.
Public works staff explained that under DOH's maximum-day demand basis the city currently has zero available ERUs in that pressure zone. Lehi Ramsey, public assistant public works director, told the council the applications were submitted before the city's ETA policy went into effect and that the developments would share infrastructure, so the applications had been presented together.
Corey Davidson, civil review manager, and consultant representatives said the Larson zone is hydraulically stressed by pipe size, elevation and lack of equalizing storage. Corey Davidson said the ETA policy "worked exactly as intended" by opening these items for twice-yearly review and that staff ultimately recommended denial based on current capacity figures.
Developer and audience representatives urged flexibility and proposed conditions (for example, delaying connection until new well and treatment systems come online). Mr. Dormeyer, who has participated in prior water planning, said the first home connections likely would not occur until 2028–29 and urged the council to consider conditional ETAs tied to future capacity improvements.
Council members expressed concern about potential Department of Health oversight if the city extended more connections than allowed and questioned whether the DOH average could be revisited after two years of lower pumping data. Several members said they favored additional analysis rather than approving connections now.
Outcome: after extended discussion, the council agreed to table the applications for more study and directed staff to expedite analysis of recent conservation and pumping data to determine whether a resubmission to DOH would be justified.
