Local History Index: Government Index: 

Sewer History in Town of Lisbon /Village of Sussex

Transcribed and edited by Michael R. Reilly

December 22, 2005 Updated 12/23/2005

Sussex has smaller building lots, and services them with municipal wells and sewer lines, while Lisbon has larger lots with septic tanks and residential wells. Eventually, however, Lisbon did begin sewer service to some subdivisions whose location and problems required it.

    The Lisbon Town Board will hold a public hearing in early May, 2000 to adopt Waukesha County's Land Use Plan in order to amend the plan.

    Jeff Musche, town clerk, said the county's land use plan currently encourages land owners in areas bordering other municipalities to annex their property to those municipalities.

    The current zoning in the border areas, under the county land use plan, requires sewer service. The town doesn't have sewer service, though it does contract with Sussex's sewer.

    Musche said the town would like to change the zoning in these areas to a low-density urban residential zoning. This would protect these lands from annexation, as well as protect green space, Musche said. Source: Sussex Sun, April 11, 2000

    Both Sussex and the town of Lisbon will keep their identities as individual municipalities, but will work together on planning issues and may soon share services, according to an agreement approved Wednesday night.

    For residents in so called "joint planning areas," both Sussex and Lisbon must agree before property can be annexed to the village, Stan Riffle, an attorney representing Sussex, said. Those lands typically lie in the Extraterritorial Zoning (ETZ) area extending from the village border about a mile and a half into the town. Currently, representatives from Lisbon and Sussex meet monthly to manage planning issues in the ETZ.

    The agreement also outlines certain "added service areas" which will remain in the town, but could receive sewer service when capacity is added to the village's processing plant in three to four years.

    According to Bill Mielke, of Ruekert and Mielke engineers, the current plant has the capacity to treat about 3.2 million gallons of wastewater per day. The facility is designed, however, to allow multiple expansions and can be enlarged as more treatment capacity is needed.

    Waste disposal service to residents in the town who currently purchase wastewater disposal capacity or who live in Lisbon's sanitary district will not be affected by the plan, Riffle said. Source: Sussex Sun, January 3, 2001.

    Village of Sussex - Department of Public Works Director Ray Grzys said he expected a concession stand owned by the Sussex Land O' Lakes Cardinals baseball club at Village Park, destroyed by an intentionally-set fire, to be completely replaced by the end of this week. However, the new building will not include restrooms, as some had hoped.

    Starting from scratch bumped the reconstruction budget up $5,000 to about $17,000, which will be covered by the village's insurance. What insurance wouldn't cover, however, was the proposed addition of men's and women's restrooms to the building.

    Cardinals' games tend to draw large crowds to Village Park, and portable toilets are provided. But when the stand was damaged, village trustee Fred Gallant suggested exploring the addition of permanent facilities.

    Grzys said the village looked into such a project, and determined it to be too cost-prohibitive. The job would have called for concrete footings to support the restrooms, which would have required blasting through the park's rocky surface. Then a sewer line would have to have been extended through the park, and grinder pumps would have been installed. All that, plus the building and fixtures, would have cost about $90,000, Grzys said.

    Insurance would cover repairing or replacing the stand to the way it was before the fire, but would not cover any additions. Since the baseball club is responsible for the stand, the group would have to have picked up the tab for the restrooms. So the new stand will be ready, and the port-o-lets will be back. Source: Sussex Sun, May 2, 2001

    The village's 2020 planning committee gave village officials approval to take the village's 2020 plan to the public at a special meeting held Wednesday at Village Hall. Trustee Roger Johnson suggested linking the staging plans with the village's plans for sewer and water expansion. "It would be foolish to put (new construction) in areas that we don't plan to have service in," he said. Current plans for expansion of the village's sewer system don't begin until 2005 or 2006.

    "Sewer is very important. It is in the planning stages," said Swartz. The village is trying to limit expansion of sewer with a plan whereby limited improvements to the plant produce the highest amount of capacity, Swartz said.

    "We can add a million gallons for a couple million dollars," he said. To get more expansion, the project cost could swell to $10 million, and that may not be what the village wants to do, he said.  "We wanted to make sure (the 2020 plan and the sewer growth plans) mesh, so we don't have to put more capital into it than we can afford." Source: Sussex Sun, July 30, 2002

    Villagers and the Sussex Plan Commission both gave their approval to the village's vision of its near future. The Smart Growth Comprehensive Plan was first announced in May of 2002, but it's been in the works for a lot longer than that. "This is a continuation of planning that began over 25 years ago," said Village Trustee Roger Johnson, chairman of the planning task force. He explained that Sussex first developed a plan in 1980 and again in 1990 and in 1996.  

    In 1999, Wisconsin enacted what is widely referred to as its "smart growth legislation." Among other things, the legislation ensures that by 2010, every city, village, county and town in the state will be guided by a comprehensive plan as defined by state statute.

    The amount of growth will be phased in for practical purposes. "Our existing sewer capacity is at the max," said Johnson. "2005 is the soonest we can increase capacity," said Johnson. Source: Sussex Sun, March 25, 2003.

    Village of Sussex ­- The absorp­tion of Sussex Estates by the village started to pay off yesterday when work began to replace the area's failing water main. Sussex Estates used to be a land trust with its own separate water system. It agreed to become part of Sussex to update that system, village assistant administrator, Jeremy Smith said. Source: Sussex Sun, July 1, 2003.

    Town of Lisbon - An overflow crowd jammed the Town Hall's board meeting room Friday night, demanding solutions to the problems that have plagued them since two Halquist quarry blasts rocked their world Oct. 9. 

     Lisbon Town Board Chairman Gerald Schmitz tried to get a read on the crowd's feelings about replacing their wells with a sewer and water system. Village Engineer John Stigler called it the only long-term solution to the problem, but admitted it would take at least two years to install it. He also said the system would increase the value of any property it served.

    The residents' reaction to the idea was mixed, many feeling it was the wrong question at the time. "We want to know what you're going to do about Halquist now," several said.  Lawrence Genrich of Maple Avenue agreed with Schmitz and Stigler that "the only long-term fix is municipal water. I've told my son, don't buy any house with a well and a septic tank or mound."

    Schmitz said that such a system would require an agreement with Sussex for access to its municipal sewer and water system. He said the village had refused to make such an arrangement when the boundary agreement between the two communities was signed. Source: Sussex Sun, October 28, 2003.

    Lisbon officials, including Schmitz and Village Engineer John Stigler, had suggested at an overflow public meeting on the subject Oct. 24 that a municipal sewer and water system was the only long-run solution. Town Supervisor Ron Evert had suggested a community well instead. All possibilities "are on the table," Musche said.

    Schmitz said he had not pursued any single option, including starting discussions with Sussex about tapping into its municipal water system, because the residents of the affected area had given the board no clear indication of which way they wanted to go.

    "I know you want hard numbers before we decide on a direction," Schmitz told the Salentines and Emil Glodoski, the only three from the area at Monday's meeting. Glodoski agreed that his neighbors were "split on the municipal water issue. Some of them are not sure they can afford it. This is not a rich neighborhood." Source: Sussex Sun, November 11, 2003.

    Town of Lisbon Hamilton School District - Of the district's 2,234 property tax­payers, the 1,667 without sewer hook-ups will average $2,339.10 in school taxes this year 10.8%, or $237.66, more than last year  after deducting the state lottery credit of $99.14. The school district's 567 property owners hooked up to sewer lines will pay $89.60 more, for an average tax of $4,110.70 - plus an additional $365 sewer hook-up bill if they haven't paid it yet. Source: Sussex Sun, December 9, 2003.

    At the Feb. 24 Sussex Village Board meeting, several trustees and County Supervisor Henry Carlson, a former village trustee suggested it would make sense to lay down sewer lines at the same time. Town Clerk Jeff Musche agreed that it would "make the most sense" to lay water and sewer lines at the same time, but warned that sewer lines were far more expensive. While it is necessary to dig down only five to six feet to lay water pipes, 20-30 feet is required to lay sewer lines, he said. And the hard rock close to the surface would make it even more expensive.

    Town Chairman Gerald Schmitz told the Town Board at its Feb. 23 meeting that Lisbon is also looking at other options, including requesting water from the city of Pewaukee, or constructing a municipal well in the affected area. He said he was also willing to consider letting Sussex annex the area, if that's what it takes to get municipal water from the village.

    Lisbon has already been working with Pewaukee on a request to supply another subdivision Country Club Estates in the town's southeast corner, south of Lisbon Road and between Duplainville and Town Line roads with city water. Lisbon has received a "positive response," from Pewaukee, Musche said meaning city officials have told him, "It could be done," he said. About three or four wells at Country Club Estates fail each year, Musche said. 

    Pewaukee estimated that supplying Country Club Estates with water could cost about $1 million, Musche said. With that estimate in mind, he thought it might cost about $700,000 to do the same for the two Maple Avenue area subdivisions. Each neighborhood numbers about 50 homes. Adding $3,000 to $5,000 for the lateral lines to connect the water mains to each home, the total cost per household could reach $15,000 to $20,000 for the Maple Avenue area and more for Country Club Estates.
Source: Sussex Sun, March 2, 2004.

    Town of Lisbon - Homeowners in the Maple Avenue and Lisbon Road area who've been waiting more than seven months for a solution to the problems afflicting their wells will have to wait at least two more years before they'll see a solution pouring from their faucets. 

    Schmitz emphasized, however, that "opening up the boundary agreement is out," though, he added, "an amendment would be fine." He was responding to a previous Village Board statement that said Sussex would not consider supplying water to that neighborhood without a change in the boundary agreement. He and Town Supervisor Robert Williams, an engineer who's been in touch with the families in the affected area, did appear to agree with Knapp's comment, though, that "if it's going to be water, it's got to be sewer and water."

    According to Lisbon Town Clerk Jeffrey Musche, if the decision is made, it would take one and a half to two years from that point to bring Sussex municipal water to the area. The decision, itself, however, might be six months away, he added.

    Paul Brown said in another telephone interview, "I still can't drink the water here; it's bad water." "I talked to the DNR, and they said, 'Don't drink it.' "They told me I could use it for housecleaning or for laundry, and that we could brush our teeth or shower with it, as long as we didn't swallow any of it.' "

    Musche also estimated that the cost of bringing Sussex water to the afflicted neighborhood would be about $1.2 million, and that adding a sewer system would double the cost, "plus a little more because it has to be buried deeper," he said. He added that he could only guess at sewer installation costs because Town Engineer John Stigler had only come up with preliminary cost projections for water, not for sewer services.

    The two together add up to at least $2.5 million, or about $50,000 per household for the 52 homes in the area. If financed by a 20-year bond, which Musche called "typical," that would cost homeowners about $2,500 per year. They would also have to pay Sussex an additional user fee for the ongoing water service, itself, Musche said. Source: Sussex Sun, May 18, 2004.

    Residents, experts and Lisbon officials have come up with four possible solutions:

· Bringing Sussex municipal water and sewer services down Maple Avenue to those 50-plus homes.

· Drilling a community well to serve the whole area.

· Creating several "water trusts" to serve small groups of homes with shared wells.

· Letting the homeowners fend for themselves individually, creating and paying for their own solutions.

    Most of the experts, including Chad Czarkowski of the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources (DNR) office in Milwaukee, and Lisbon Town Engineer John Stigler, agree that the best long-term solution is for Lisbon and Sussex to come to an agreement that would supply the area with Sussex municipal water and sewer services. Politically, however, that idea seems dead in the water. Despite several meetings and exchanges of letters between the two communities, Sussex and Lisbon are no closer to such a solution than they were a year ago.

    Czarkowski believes that aging and failing residential septic systems are one of the sources of bacteria in some homes' water supplies. Because of the high bedrock in the area around quarries, he said, "even rainwater can carry bacteria into well water" because "it doesn't get filtered."

    The area's 50-plus households also raise the stakes. "Fifty is the magic number," Czarkowski said, because the DNR requires a community well that serves at least that number of households to add either a second well or a two-day reservoir in order to back up the main well.

    Community wells often have to be drilled deeper than 500 feet, Czarkowski added, increasing the risk of radium contamination. Blending the water from both a deep and a shallow well could meet both needs, he said. He also suggested a third solution: several water trusts that would serve no more than six households each, thereby avoiding the costs of complying with state regulations. Source: Sussex Sun, October 26, 2004.

    "There are a lot of unhappy people here," said Beverly Johnson, who lives on North­view Drive. "I've lived here 27 years, and I had no problems until three years ago when the dynamiting and the dust got really bad." Mike Gotthardt of Maple Avenue said he was dining at Perks restaurant near Sussex Village Hall at the time, "and the whole building shook."

    Asked about the blast, Halquist Stone Co. President Tom Halquist said, "As long as we have the lawsuit going, I can't comment on any of this." That lawsuit was filed earlier this year by attorney Ted Warpinski on behalf of 29 resi­dents of the area who claimed they were affected by last year's blasts.
Source: Sussex Sun, December 14, 2004.

    An attorney from the firm Ladewig, Rechlicz & Iggens, representing Walters, reiterated his explanation that the delay was caused by lack of municipal water and sewer service to the business's property at N64 W22998 Highway 74. The business now gets its water from a private well. The nearest village water and sewer lines are 600-700 feet away at either Highway 74 or Quad/Graphics on Main Street. The commission did not seem inclined to accept the attorney's explanation.

    In a telephone interview Monday, Walters said he couldn't afford the $35,000 to $40,000 it would take to meet village requirements that he hook up two sprinkler heads that could supply continuous water for 15 minutes. Walters said he proposed an alternative "detection data system" a series of heat sensors and smoke detectors that would cost just $8,000. He would prefer to be hooked up to Sussex's municipal sewer and water lines, but, he claimed, village officials told him the village couldn't afford it. "Why can't they? What have I been paying taxes for the last 30 years?" he asked.

    Responding to Walters' attorney at the Plan Commission meeting Feb. 17, Fire Chief Corky Curtis said he had already made several suggestions for less costly ways of supplying water to a sprinkling system using the company's existing well. The simplest plan, Curtis said, would install a 400-gallon holding tank with a pump that would supply enough water for two sprinkler heads to contain a fire for 20 minutes until the firefighters could arrive.  Source: Sussex Sun, February 23, 2005.

    The proposed sewer and  water project is facing opposition from city residents concerned about increased development, and increased costs to area residents and sewer and water customers. Under the developer's agreements with the City of Pewaukee, the city would construct the sewer and water lines but the developer would fund the majority of the project. The developer would be reimbursed as other area properties develop.

    The estimated $3 million project includes construction of a $1 million sanitary sewer lift station that would serve an area that extends along parts of Swan Road and Pewaukee Road on the west and to properties east of Duplainville Road. Weyer Road and the Town of Lisbon border are on the northern boundary of the area. Valley Brook and mainly undeveloped lands north of Capitol Drive lie south of the southern border of the service area.

    Under the proposed project, properties in Lisbon, such as the church, would also have the opportunity to hook up to sewer and water utilities. Lisbon will require that the church be rebuilt with a sprinkler system connected to an adequate water supply, such as a municipal water system. Source: Sussex Sun, April 15, 2005.

    The Plan Commission did express some concern about the church's water supply and sprinkler system, especially in case of another fire. Commissioner Neil Sasse asked, "If the power goes out, do the sprinklers go out, too?" Kubala Washatko architect Vince Micha admitted that they would.

    Plan Commissioner and Town Supervisor Ronald Evert said the solution to that problem would be a fire hydrant, but "no hydrant is going in there until municipal water goes in there." The new church will be supplied by a water well and a 12,000-gallon underground storage tank with more than enough capacity to supply the sprinklers, Micha assured the Plan Commission. Church plans also indicate where hydrants would go if municipal water ever comes to the area.

    Lisbon is negotiating with the City of Pewaukee for municipal water and sewer services for the nearby Country Club Estates subdivision, which would also supply the church. The church and the subdivision are both south of Lisbon Road. Source: Sussex Sun, May 11, 2005

    Village of Sussex – With the approval of the Department of Natural Resources (DNR) behind it, Sussex is now looking for  engineering design firms to submit proposals on how to implement the village's waste water  treatment plant expansion plan. The plant handles all of the village's residential and commer­cial wastewater. There are no septic tanks in Sussex. The plant also serves the Town of Lisbon and its sanitary district, the Village of Lannon and a portion of the Village of Menomonee Falls.

    Sussex expects to finance the $5.9 million expansion with a Clean Water Fund low-interest loan. The other municipalities served by the plant will share that cost, based on the percentage of plant capacity each one reserves. Increasing the plant's capacity "will allow us to continue managing our 2020 growth plan," said Village Administrator Evan Teich. Source: Sussex Sun, July 6, 2005.

    Village of Sussex – The village is offering a guar­an­tee for private wells within a half-mile of the new municipal well it is building near Maple Avenue and Plainfield Road. The guarantee is part of a new Water Commission policy on Well No. 6 the Village Board approved unanimously Aug. 9. The well will be on land the village is "attaching" from the Town of Lisbon as part of the two communities' boundary agreement. 

    Lisbon Town Supervisor Dar­rell Rupnow, whose family lives near the future well, had asked Sussex at the hearing for a 20-year guarantee that would cover any problems with his well, including replacing the pump or drilling a new well, that might arise from any lowering of the water table caused by the new well. Lisbonites who live farther away also wanted coverage up to two miles from the new well. The new Sussex policy won't go quite that far. It's a five-year guarantee, through Jan. 1, 2011, covering wells within a half-mile radius whose owners file reports on their wells' status by Jan. 1, 2006.

    Sussex will provide a form to well owners within that area, asking them for the infor­ma­tion the village will need before it can honor any well damage claim under the guarantee. The form asks for a well's age, depth, casing depth, maintenance record, and static and pumping water levels. "Without such baseline information," Teich said, "we have no basis for compensating them."

    The Sussex Water Commission recommended the new policy after rejecting a request from Lisbon Town Chairman Gerald Schmitz for financial assistance from Sussex to help Lisbon well owners provide the village with their wells' base­line information. Source: Sussex Sun, August 17, 2005

    Village of Sussex—The Village Board created a new storm water utility Dec. 13 to reduce pollution and erosion in and around the village's waterways—mostly Sussex Creek. The utility will help Sussex comply with Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources (DNR) regulations NR 216 and 151, which it established to administer parts of the federal Environmental Protection Act.  Those mandates also require communities in the Fox River water basin to reduce pollutants ("suspended solids") pouring into local streams from storm water runoff by at least 20 percent by 2008 and 40 percent by 2014

    Assistant Village Administrator Jeremy Smith said in a later interview that the program would serve a dual purpose to retard erosion around the village's waterways (mostly Sussex Creek and its tributaries), but mainly to reduce pollutant discharge into those waters.

    To finance the utility's capital and operating expenses, the board voted to impose a $5-per-month charge on homeowners, billed quarterly with the village's water and sewer charges. Village Engineer Curt Bol­ton explained in an interview later that week that the utility's charges would be based on the square footage of a property's "impervious surfaces" including driveways, property walkways, roofs, patios and, for businesses and organizations, parking lots. Village sidewalks and driveway approaches would not be included, he added. Property owners would be charged for each equivalent runoff unit (ERU) or 3,897 square feet of impervious surface Boehm explained. Businesses that install deten­tion ponds designed to control storm water runoff could receive a credit toward their storm water utility charges, Boehm added.

    The village expects to spend $158,000 on storm water projects next year, and as much as $234,000 by 2010, based on what the board heard from Earth Tech senior engineer Chuck Boehm in October. That's what it will take to create new detention ponds and enlarge existing ones, he said, and to create and maintain wetlands to filter some of the storm water runoff before it reaches the village's streams. Source: Sussex Sun, October 12 and December 21, 2005.

    The village fixed a 39,000-gallon-a-day leak last month, after finding it with the help of Water Leak Locators of Platteville. That's about 14 million gallons of water a year from a hole in the pipeline no wider than a pencil's diameter, Village Engineer Curt Bolton told the Village Board at its Dec. 13 meeting.

    "What was unique about this leak," Smith explained in a telephone interview Monday, "is that it was going into wetlands, not coming up in people's yards." That water line opened sometime in the mid-1990s.

    The village also fixed another leak along Silver Spring Road, which had also gone unnoticed, because it spilled into Sussex Creek. Smith said there were 10 more leaks, and the village planned to plug them, "one leak at a time." Source: Sussex Sun, December 21, 2005.