By Elizabeth Cloutman

Los Altos Hills

Three jurisdictions overlap in providing Los Altos Hills’ sanitary sewer system. The town conveys sewage to the water quality control plant through the Palo Alto and Los Altos basins. The town has separate usage agreements with both cities. Homes in the southern part of town connect to the Los Altos lines, while homes in northern part connect to Palo Alto’s.

Last March, it became clear Los Altos faced both legal and logistical challenges in providing new sewer connections for Los Altos Hills and unincorporated home sites in a timely manner. Officials from both cities are seeking a temporary solution.

Completing a new Los Altos Basin Master Plan between the two cities could take close to three years, according to Los Altos Hills Public Works Director Mintze Cheng. At the urging of Los Altos City Council members, Los Altos Hills City Manager Maureen Cassingham said she planned to meet with the Los Altos city manager and the public works director sometime this week to negotiate a temporary solution.

“What we’re looking for is a temporary administrative decsion,” Cassingham said. “It’s a matter of being able to administrate our existing connections with the current agreement and working on a long-term solution.”

Los Altos is in a quandary, not only having accepted more sewer fee applicants than allowed by a 1985 agreement with Los Altos Hills, but with its sewer lines already at nearly 90 percent of operating capacity. An additional 470 parcels within the Los Altos basin are not connected to the sewer system and have not purchased capacity rights, Cheng said.

In contrast, Los Altos Hills’ agreement with Palo Alto allows for more sewer connections in the northern section of town than are ever likely to be used, according to Cheng. Residents of northern Los Altos Hills are using between one-quarter to one-third of their contracted sewer capacity.

In 1985, Los Altos contracted with Los Altos Hills to provide up to 1,100 additional connections. Unfortunately Los Altos accepted 200 more sewer fees from town residents than were agreed upon.

To compound the problem, in August, the Los Altos Hills City Council prezoned additional home sites, incorporated as the Mora Drive Sewer Project, to connect with the town’s existing sewer main.

The council made this decision because these homes lie within Los Altos Hills’ sphere of influence.

The county’s Local Agency Formation Commission required these residents to obtain prezoning as a condition for approving the Mora Drive sewer project.

Cheng said drawing up a new sewer master plan could take up to 30 months, causing residents a long delay.