Agenda - 04-19-1994-IX-A - Laserfiche WebLink

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r - i 3 ISSUE 2 - MANAGEMENT ENTITY FOR TYPE IV SYSTEMS - The OCHD proposed that it serve as the management entity for Type IV systems. We were not persuaded that the private sector would not perform this function adequately. Private sector companies should be the management entity for DEH Type IV systems. The OCHD should inspect these systems every 18 months (or some other Justifiable period) and charge a fee to recover the cost of the inspection. Staff Response OCHD will inspect these systems at the DEH required frequency of once every three years and will not serve as the management entity for these systems. Any greater frequency than the DEH min'mum would be an additional cost to the home owner. NOTE: Commissioners Gordon and Insko were concerned by the failure of private management entities to submit the required operating reports to the Health Department. They also indicated they wished to revisit the question of who should provide service to Type IV systems. Staff Response One of the basic policy questions related to utilization of a public or private sector management entity is how much is the County willing to pay, or cause individual system owners to pay, to ensure that operational requirements of these systems are met. As a result of the review of this issue, County staff has developed three possible tiers of oversight assistance. Each tier is progressively more expensive but provides a correspondingly higher level of assurance of proper system functionality. Tier 1 service is represented by the County' s current practice whereby the private sector provides the least expensive and regulatory minimum level of system operational and maintenance service and the Health Department provides system inspection and operational oversight at the regulatory maximum frequency of three year intervals. As of this date, Health staff has received only a small percentage of the reports that these private sector organizations have been required to submit. This breakdown in the reporting process may be indicative of the newness of the operational process or it may be indicative of the failure of the private sector to provide adequate service. If private sector entities are failing to provide adequate service and if this failure transpires over a three years period before it is detected by the Health staff' s first system inspection, components (such as nitrification fields) of some systems may be severely damaged.