Sand Creek sewage odor not a health hazard

QUESTION: We have an odor that comes down Sand Creek at night. We called the city Utilities, as it has a sewer smell to it. We were told there is a substation out east that releases treated sewage at night into Sand Creek and that it is not a health concern. Can this be a legal operation or should the EPA look into it? Sand Creek is not always full running and the soil gets permeated with the sewage smell and when the sun hits the sand the smell is foul. Also, children play in the creek behind Wildflower Elementary school. Should the Health Department be notified?
- Linda Watkins

ANSWER: Cherokee Metropolitan District, which covers the Cimarron Hills area, discharges treated sewage into Sand Creek and has always done this, according to district general manager Kip Petersen. There is “no raw sewage running down the stream and no health issue” and it is monitored by the Health Department and the state, he said. Unless it rains, the discharge from the sewage treatment plant off U.S. Highway 24 near Peterson Field is usually the only water running down Sand Creek. “We like it when it rains because it flushes the stream,” Petersen said.
There have been some recent odor problems because of “blower issues” in the system.

Changes are coming by late 2008 or early 2009, when the water district should open a new sewage treatment plant about 20 miles away in the less-developed southeast part of the county and decommissions the current plant.