To: Honorable Mayor and Members of Town Council
From: Mark Marlowe, P.E., Utilities Director
Title
Information: Recreational Vehicle Dump Station Closing
Body
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Executive Summary
The purpose of this item is to notify Town Council of the proposed closing of the recreational vehicle (RV) dump station located at Public Works Department site. Over the years, this service has been provided at no cost to the user which means that the costs to provide the service have been subsidized by the entire customer rate base. Most of the users of this facility are from out of town since it is listed on various web sites and brings traffic from outside the community.
In its current format, there is no way for a charge to be imposed for this service (like most other RV dump stations do). Castle Rock Water explored having the station redesigned and rebuilt to allow for this and also to address space and security concerns at Public Works. The low bid price to rebuild the station to meet the needs is $235,000, which was significantly above what we originally budgeted of $110,000 plus the $80,000 included in the 2nd Quarter Budget Amendment, for a total budget of $190,000.
Most RV dump sites charge between $10 to $27 which at least covers the cost of the sewer charges (but likely none of the maintenance, tracking, infrastructure, etc.). At this cost per dump, we would have a very difficult time ever recovering the capital investment for bringing this facility up to needed standards. Charging enough to recover our capital investment in a reasonable time would likely chase any customers away leaving us with an investment that would be very difficult to ever recover the cost. In addition, these discharges are difficult to treat even at the wastewater treatment plant, and therefore are not really conducive to our future reuse plans. For these reasons, our plan is to close the facility at the end of the season (after Labor Day).
Notification and Outreach Efforts
Notification and announcement for closing the RV dump station has been in the form of a press release, July Town Talk, and signage at the facility.
Recommendation
Staff recommends proceeding with the closing of the facility as outlined.