The Wahkiakum County Eagle - Established as The Skamokawa Eagle in 1891

The Wahkiakum County PUD Board of Commissioners on Tuesday approved a resolution to update and amend the water contract with the Town of Cathlamet.

The PUD and the town negotiated changes to the maintenance costs, plant operating costs and vehicle costs. The PUD also agreed to pay a share of the project costs for the water filtration plant and any storage or transmission improvements. A representative from the town will meet with the PUD auditor each month to examine invoices that the town would like to be considered in the cost of production.

Whether the town will continue to provide water to Puget Island after 2037 has not yet been ascertained.

The town and PUD have been working on the amendments for three years or more.

“I want to thank everyone for their patience, determination and commitment to reaching this agreement,” Commissioner Robert Jungers said. “It is a great relief to all parties involved, I’m sure.”

The commissioners also authorized General Manager David Tramblie to sign a Memorandum of Understanding with the Pacific PUD in order to build an intertie between the two counties.

The intertie will maintain power for the Westend when the PUD takes the Grays River substation offline for improvements.

Tramblie has been speaking with an engineer from Gray & Osborne to determine the best course of action to construct the intertie, as well as the potential cost of the project.

The major question has been whether to bore beneath Deep River or to hang a line from the bridge.

According to Tramblie, Gray & Osborne believes it could cost more than $200,000 for engineering, construction and permitting to attach the line to the bridge.

He would like to do it in house and believes that he can get it done for less than $200,000.

“I need to get this intertie built,” Tramblie said. “Every day that goes by I get more concerned about the Grays River transformer. I’m trying to move forward as quickly as I can.”

“The only downside I see is that any reference to a water project is right where it is right now," Commissioner Gene Healy said. “Nowhere.”

“Western Wahkiakum Water System just doesn’t have money to put pipe in the ground,” Tramblie said. “It’s just not there. We have a number of projects that I think are more pressing, one of them being the computer system at the well site.”

Commissioner Dennis Reid agreed.

“We have to maintain what we already have first,” he said.