One of the District’s basic powers is to furnish sanitary facilities for sewerage. It maintains a Wastewater Reclamation Treatment Plant aka Wastewater Resource Recovery Facility (“WRRF”) at Sweetwater Drive. According to the District, the Treatment Plant treats “an average of 1.3 million gallons of wastewater daily. The collection and export system for (that) wastewater includes…a twenty-mile export pipeline (which) take(s) treated effluent out of the Tahoe Basin for final disposal (in Douglas County)”¹ at 900 acres commonly known as the IVGID wetlands in Carson City.

NRS 318.116(11) states that GIDs, like IVGID, which have been granted the basic power to furnish sanitary facilities for sewerage, may “furnish…sanitary facilities…as provided in NRS 318.140.” NRS 318.140(1)(c) states that GID “board(s) may…sell any product or by-product thereof.” Given wastewater is a by-product of sewer treatment², it may be sold by IVGID.

NRS 318.199(2) states that “whenever the board of trustees…of any district organized…under this chapter and authorized to furnish sanitary sewer facilities³ pursuant to NRS 318.140 or…water facilities pursuant to NRS 318.144…proposes to change any individual or joint rate, toll, charge, service or product, or any individual or joint practice which will affect any rate, toll, charge, service or product, the board of trustees shall hold public hearings after 30 days’ notice has been given to all users of the service or product within the district.” NRS 318.199(5) states that only “after public hearing…if…the board of trustees determines that the proposed action is required, the board shall adopt a resolution establishing the new or changed rates, tolls, charges, services to be performed or products to be furnished.” Yet on September 19, 2016, in lieu of the public hearing requirements of NRS 318.199, Mr. Pomroy (our then Director of Public Works) entered into a ten (10) year September 8, 2016 agreement, on behalf of the District, with the Schneider Family Trust (“Schneider”) for the sale of IVGID wastewater for irrigation purposes⁴. At the Board’s April 10, 2019 meeting this subject came up and Trustee Callicrate stated that until receipt of an e-mail to the Board from a member of the public he had no idea that IVGID was selling treated wastewater to anyone; let alone that the District had entered into a contract to sell the same with Schneider.

On/about July 1, 2017, in lieu of the public hearing requirements of NRS 318.199, Mr. Pomroy entered into a forty (40) year amendment to an earlier July 1, 2008 amended agreement with the Club at Clear Creek Tahoe, Inc. (“Clear Creek”), purportedly on IVGID’s behalf, for the sale of IVGID wastewater for irrigation purposes.

¶4.1 of the Schneider agreement sets the fees the trust pays for IVGID wastewater to “twenty-five-cents ($0.25) per one-thousand (1,000) gallons of (liquid) effluent” plus a yearly Consumer Price Index (“CPI”) increase. ¶4.1 of the Clear Creek agreement changed the fees the Club pays for IVGID wastewater to “one dollar and fourteen cents ($1.14) per one-thousand (1,000) gallons of (liquid) effluent plus (an) effluent meter base charge…of four hundred dollars ($400)…on a monthly basis.” So what excess water charges do Schneider and Clear Creek pay? What capital improvement costs (“CIC:) do they pay? What about enhanced CICs that represent the additional capital costs we incur to deliver the wastewater they purchase? These costs are all missing. And compare these amounts to what the District’s commercial water and sewer customers pay for their water usage/sewerage treatment. Schneider and Clear Creek are getting quite a bargain. And why? Because the Board has abdicated essentially all powers to its unelected staff. And what did the Board do to address this abuse once it was brought to its attention? Nothing.

1. Go to https://www.yourtahoeplace.com/public-works/sewer/about-our-sewer-system.
2. According to ¶2.47 of Sewer Ordinance No. 2, wastewater is “a combination of the liquid and water-carried wastes from residences, commercial buildings, industrial plants, and institutions, together with any ground water, surface water, and storm water that may be present.”
3. The District was granted this basic power in its initiating ordinance.
4. Although ¶4.03(A) of Sewer Ordinance No. 2 sets forth the Director of Public Works’ duties thereunder, one of them isn’t to enter into contracts for the sale and delivery of wastewater without Board approval.