2020 -- S 2473 | |
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LC004192 | |
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STATE OF RHODE ISLAND | |
IN GENERAL ASSEMBLY | |
JANUARY SESSION, A.D. 2020 | |
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A N A C T | |
RELATING TO COVENTRY SEWER AUTHORITY | |
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Introduced By: Senators Raptakis, and Rogers | |
Date Introduced: February 13, 2020 | |
Referred To: Senate Housing & Municipal Government | |
It is enacted by the General Assembly as follows: | |
1 | SECTION 1. Section 1 of Chapter 330 of the Public Laws of 1997, as amended by |
2 | Chapters 119 and 140 of the Public Laws of 2006, and Chapters 286 and 300 of the Public Laws |
3 | of 2019, is hereby amended to read as follows: |
4 | Sec. 1. The town of Coventry is authorized and empowered in accordance with the |
5 | provisions of this act, to plan, lay out, construct, finance, operate, and maintain sewage works for |
6 | a part or the whole of its territory and for such purposes to take by eminent domain or otherwise |
7 | any lands, water rights, rights-of-way, or easements, public or private, in the town necessary for |
8 | accomplishing any purpose mentioned in this act. The sewage works may include sewers and |
9 | sewer service connections, pumping stations, sewage treatment works, sewage disposal works, |
10 | and other works essential to the proper collection and disposal of the sewage of the town. |
11 | As used in this act, unless the context otherwise requires |
12 | "Preliminary plans" shall mean engineering reports that shall conform to all applicable |
13 | state and federal guidelines and shall include detailed scope and area to be considered with |
14 | recommendations, preliminary and feasibility investigation, environmental assessment, cost |
15 | studies, economic comparisons of alternatives, and all application and pre-application work and |
16 | other work necessary or desirable before undertaking working plans. |
17 | "Working plans" shall mean final design plans of facilities, detailed construction |
18 | drawings, specifications, detailed estimate of cost of construction, and shall include all other |
19 | engineering work that may be required or advisable for actual construction of sewage works. |
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1 | "Town" means the town of Coventry. |
2 | "Council" means the town council of the town of Coventry. |
3 | "Highways" means any state or other highway and any public street, alley, park, |
4 | parkway, driveway, bridge, or public place. |
5 | "Sewage works" means all constructions for collection, transportation, pumping, |
6 | treatment, and final disposal of sewage. |
7 | "Common sewer" means a sewer in which all abutters have equal rights of entrance |
8 | and use. |
9 | "Force main" means a sewer wherein sewage is moved by pressure. |
10 | "Sewer service connection" means a pipe to convey sewage and wastes from a |
11 | building to a common sewer. |
12 | "Sewage" shall mean wastewater, water-carried wastes, or a combination of them, |
13 | discharged into and conveyed by sewers or intended or customarily so discharged and conveyed. |
14 | Sewage may be further classified as follows: |
15 | "Sanitary sewage" shall mean the common wastewater and water-carried wastes from |
16 | human dwellings and from toilet and lavatory fixtures, kitchens, laundries, and similar facilities |
17 | of business and industrial buildings. In general, sanitary sewage shall not include storm water |
18 | from roofs, yards, streets, or open spaces; water from land surfaces or brooks; clean waste |
19 | overflows from springs, wells, or subsoil drainage; large volumes of clean water from air |
20 | conditioning or other cooling or condensing facilities; clean wastewater from hydraulically |
21 | operated contrivances; and those wastes included within the definition of "industrial wastes" next |
22 | following. |
23 | "Industrial wastes" shall include the liquid or water-carried wastes of any industrial |
24 | process not clearly included within the definitions of sanitary sewage, storm water, cooling water, |
25 | or subsoil drainage herein. In general, wastewaters carrying any quantity of oils, grease, fats, |
26 | abrasives, chemicals, residues of manufacturing processes, wastes from commercial food |
27 | preserving or canning, from slaughterhouses or meat processing plants, and similar substances, |
28 | whether dissolved, in suspension, or mechanically carried by water, shall be considered as |
29 | industrial wastes. |
30 | "Storm water" shall include the runoff or discharge of rain and melted snow or other |
31 | clean water from roofs, surfaces of public or private lands, or elsewhere. For most purposes |
32 | within the scope of this act, storm water shall not include the flow of any natural brook, rivulet, or |
33 | stream, even if the source of the water is storm runoff from land or other property once that |
34 | runoff has entered the channel of the brook or natural watercourse. In general, storm water shall |
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1 | include only water that is sufficiently clean and unpolluted to admit of being discharged, without |
2 | treatment or purification, into any natural open stream or watercourse without offense. |
3 | "Cooling water" shall include the clean wastewater from air conditioning, industrial |
4 | cooling, condensing, and similar apparatus and from hydraulically powered equipment. In |
5 | general, cooling water will include only water that is sufficiently clean and unpolluted to admit of |
6 | being discharged, without treatment or purification, into any natural open stream or watercourse |
7 | without offense. |
8 | "Seepage" or "subsoil drainage" shall include water from the soil percolating into |
9 | subsoil drains and through foundation walls, basement floors, or underground pipes or from |
10 | similar sources. |
11 | "Lateral sewer" means a sewer that does not receive the sewage from any other |
12 | common sewer. |
13 | "Submain sewer" means a sewer into which the sewage from two (2) or more lateral |
14 | sewers is discharged. |
15 | "Main sewer" means a sewer into which the sewage from two (2) or more submain |
16 | sewers is discharged. |
17 | "Land" means and includes any land, including building and other improvements |
18 | thereon, estate, riparial, or other right, easement, interest, or waterway. |
19 | The Town of Coventry may provide for the construction of sewers and for other sewage |
20 | works for the town and may raise funds therefor by borrowing or otherwise, and for that purpose |
21 | may issue bonds or notes of the town in accordance with the provisions hereinafter stated or |
22 | under other authority. |
23 | The town council shall provide that annual charges shall be made upon the owners of |
24 | the lands using the sewage works and that sewer assessments shall be made upon the owners of |
25 | lands for which the use of sewage works is available. The town of Coventry may charge the |
26 | owners of lands using the sewage works, monetary interest charges in excess of those interest |
27 | charges actually paid by the town for the funds it has borrowed for sewage works' purposes, up to |
28 | a maximum of one-half of one percent (.05%) of the interest charges paid by the town. The |
29 | excess interest charges shall only be used for administrative purposes. The town of Coventry shall |
30 | not assess upon the owners of land the costs associated with repaving the roadway upon |
31 | completion of any sewage works within the town. |
32 | The receipts from annual charges and sewer assessments shall be appropriated for and |
33 | applied to the payment of the charges and expenses incident to the planning, construction, |
34 | financing, operation, and maintenance of the sewage works, and to the payment of principal costs |
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1 | for any bonds or notes issued for sewage works. Nothing in this act shall limit or affect the rights |
2 | or obligations of the town of Coventry, including obligations of the town acting by and through |
3 | its financial town meeting or its town council, to appropriate monies from its regular town tax to |
4 | fund its obligations under the intermunicipal agreement in wastewater services between the town |
5 | of West Warwick and the town of Coventry, as amended and restated from time to time, and the |
6 | Loan and Trust Agreement among the Rhode Island economic development corporation, |
7 | the town of Coventry and J.P. Morgan Trust Company, National Association dated as of |
8 | December 1, 2003, as amended from time to time. |
9 | SECTION 2. This act shall take effect upon passage. |
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LC004192 | |
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EXPLANATION | |
BY THE LEGISLATIVE COUNCIL | |
OF | |
A N A C T | |
RELATING TO COVENTRY SEWER AUTHORITY | |
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1 | This act would prohibit the town of Coventry from assessing the costs of repaving the |
2 | roadway upon the completion of any sewage works upon the land owners. |
3 | This act would take effect upon passage. |
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LC004192 | |
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