Wednesday, October 14, 2009

KEY LARGO -- The Islamorada Village Council has agreed to meet next week with the Key Largo Wastewater Board to discuss an option of sending village sewage to Key Largo for treatment, but the two entities are still at odds over the details of the sit-down.

The Key Largo Wastewater Treatment District board voted 3-2 on Tuesday, Oct. 6, to send back to Islamorada a proposal that does away with the village's request to discuss the expansion of the Key Largo district boundary to include Islamorada.

"It's a deal-killer as far as I'm concerned," board member Andy Tobin said at the Oct. 6 meeting.

Then on Thursday, Oct. 8, the Village Council agreed to meet with the Key Largo sewer board at the Murray E. Nelson Government and Cultural Center on Monday, Oct. 19. But council members indicated they would not back off from the boundary discussion.

The village has suggested that the district expand its boundaries to include Islamorada, which would automatically give the town representation on the district board. The Key Largo district, instead, favors a contractual relationship that establishes the village as a customer.

"They can take it off the agenda, but I'm not going to take it off the agenda, and if I go there next week I am going to talk about it," said Islamorada Mayor Don Achenberg.

Councilman Michael Reckwerdt suggested that topic lead the agenda.

"Make that the first thing we talk about because if there's not going to be representation for Islamorada, I would rather have that conversation at the beginning of the meeting," he said. "Then, as [well-known Islamorada resident] Jim Trice used to say, 'go home and eat meatloaf.'"

During the Key Largo board's meeting two days earlier, Charlie Brooks and Norm Higgins did not even want to meet with Islamorada.

"From my point of view the train has left the station," Brooks said. "We're about to finish on a project [in Key Largo] and this is a distraction that is not in the best interest of the people of Key Largo."

Any arrangement between the entities would need to be expedited given the district's construction schedule, officials said.

The district has already awarded the contract to extend the transmission pipeline south to the Tavernier Creek Bridge, the point at which Islamorada would connect if an agreement is reached. Construction is to begin within about 30 days.

Tobin suggested adding a discussion about whether the 2.3 million-gallons-a-day treatment plant being built at mile marker 100.5 has the capacity to handle the equivalent of 14,000 homes in Key Largo along with 9,000 homes from Islamorada.

But Tobin looked forward to determining whether an agreement between the two entities can bring about rate reductions for homeowners in both areas.

"We're one community," he said. "A rate reduction is what the citizens need. We need to keep rates for all of us as low as possible. It has always been my belief that we'll see a rate reduction [in Key Largo] and by working together we'll bring down rates for Islamorada too."

sgibbs@keysnews.com

Staff writer Robert Silk contributed to this report.