Chapter 286 |
2019 -- S 0201 SUBSTITUTE A Enacted 07/19/2019 |
A N A C T |
RELATING TO COVENTRY SEWER AUTHORITY |
Introduced By: Senators Raptakis, and Rogers |
Date Introduced: January 31, 2019 |
It is enacted by the General Assembly as follows: |
SECTION 1. Section 1 of Chapter 330 of the Public Laws of 1997, as amended by |
Chapters 119 and 140 of the Public Laws of 2006, is hereby further amended to read as follows: |
Sec. 1. The Town town of Coventry is authorized and empowered in accordance with the |
provisions of this act, to plan, lay out, construct, finance, operate, and maintain sewage works |
fora for a part or the whole of its territory and for such purposes to take by eminent domain or |
otherwise any lands, water rights, rights-of-way, or easements, public or private, in said the town |
necessary for accomplishing any purpose mentioned in this act. Such The sewage works may |
include sewers and sewer service connections, pumping stations, sewage treatment works, sewage |
disposal works, and other works essential to the proper collection and disposal of the sewage of |
said the town. |
As used in this act, unless the context otherwise requires: |
"Preliminary plans" shall mean engineering reports which that shall conform to all |
applicable state and federal guidelines and shall include detailed scope and area to be considered |
with recommendations, preliminary and feasibility investigation, environmental assessment, cost |
studies, economic comparisons of alternatives, and all application and pre-application work and |
other work necessary or desirable before undertaking working plans. |
"Working plans" shall mean final design plans of facilities, detailed construction |
drawings, specifications, detailed estimate of cost of construction, and shall include all other |
engineering work which that may be required or advisable for actual construction of sewage |
works. |
"Town" means the Town town of Coventry. |
"Council" means the town council of the Town town of Coventry. |
"Highways" means any state or other highway and any public street, alley, park, parkway, |
driveway, bridge, or public place. |
"Sewage works" means all constructions for collection, transportation, pumping, |
treatment, and final disposal of sewage. |
"Common sewer" means a sewer in which all abutters have equal rights of entrance and |
use. |
"Force main" means a sewer wherein sewage is moved by pressure. |
"Sewer service connection" means a pipe to convey sewage and wastes from a building to |
a common sewer. |
"Sewage" shall mean wastewater, water-carried wastes, or a combination of them, |
discharged into and conveyed by sewers or intended or customarily so discharged and conveyed. |
Sewage may be further classified as follows: |
"Sanitary sewage" shall mean the common wastewater and water-carried wastes from |
human dwellings and from toilet and lavatory fixtures, kitchens, laundries, and similar facilities |
of business and industrial buildings. In general, sanitary sewage shall not include storm water |
from roofs, yards, streets, or open spaces,; water from land surfaces or brooks,; clean waste |
overflows from springs, wells, or subsoil drainage,; large volumes of clean water from air |
conditioning or other cooling or condensing facilities,; clean wastewater from hydraulically |
operated contrivances; and those wastes included within the definition of "industrial wastes" next |
following. |
"Industrial wastes" shall include the liquid or water-carried wastes of any industrial |
process not clearly included within the definitions of sanitary sewage, storm water, cooling water, |
or subsoil drainage herein. In general, wastewaters carrying any quantity of oils, grease, fats, |
abrasives, chemicals, residues of manufacturing processes, wastes from commercial food |
preserving or canning, from slaughterhouses or meat processing plants, and similar substances, |
whether dissolved, in suspension, or mechanically carried by water, shall be considered as |
industrial wastes. |
"Storm water" shall include the runoff or discharge of rain and melted snow or other |
clean water from roofs, surfaces of public or private lands, or elsewhere. For most purposes |
within the scope of this act, storm water shall not include the flow of any natural brook, rivulet, or |
stream, even if the source of such the water is storm runoff from land or other property once that |
runoff has entered the channel of such the brook or natural watercourse. In general, storm water |
shall include only water which that is sufficiently clean and unpolluted to admit of being |
discharged, without treatment or purification, into any natural open stream or watercourse without |
offense. |
"Cooling water" shall include the clean wastewater from air conditioning, industrial |
cooling, condensing, and similar apparatus and from hydraulically powered equipment. In |
general, cooling water will include only water which that is sufficiently clean and unpolluted to |
admit of being discharged, without treatment or purification, into any natural open stream or |
watercourse without offense. |
"Seepage" or "subsoil drainage" shall include water from the soil percolating into subsoil |
drains and through foundation walls, basement floors, or underground pipes or from similar |
sources. |
"Lateral sewer" means a sewer which that does not receive the sewage from any other |
common sewer. |
"Submain sewer" means a sewer into which the sewage from two (2) or more lateral |
sewers is discharged. |
"Main sewer" means a sewer into which the sewage from two (2) or more submain |
sewers is discharged. |
"Land" means and includes any land, including building and other improvements thereon, |
estate, riparial, or other right, easement, interest, or waterway. |
The Town of Coventry may provide for the construction of sewers and for other sewage |
works for said the town and may raise funds therefor by borrowing or otherwise, and for that |
purpose may issue bonds or notes of the town in accordance with the provisions hereinafter stated |
or under other authority. |
The town council shall provide that annual charges shall be made upon the owners of the |
lands using the sewage works and that sewer assessments shall be made upon the owners of lands |
for which the use of sewage works is available. The town of Coventry may charge the owners of |
lands using the sewage works, monetary interest charges in excess of those interest charges |
actually paid by the town for the funds it has borrowed for sewage works' purposes, up to a |
maximum of one-half of one percent (.05%) of the interest charges paid by the town. The excess |
interest charges shall only be used for administrative purposes. |
The receipts from annual charges and sewer assessments shall be appropriated for and |
applied to the payment of the charges and expenses incident to the planning, construction, |
financing, operation, and maintenance of the sewage works, and to the payment of principal costs |
for any bonds or notes issued for sewage works. Nothing in this act shall limit or affect the rights |
or obligations of the town of Coventry, including obligations of the town acting by and through |
its financial town meeting or its town council, to appropriate monies from its regular town tax to |
fund its obligations under the intermunicipal agreement in wastewater services between the town |
of West Warwick and the town of Coventry, as amended and restated from time to time, and the |
Loan and Trust Agreement among the Rhode Island economic development corporation, the town |
of Coventry and J.P. Morgan Trust Company, National Association dated as of December 1, |
2003, as amended from time to time. |
SECTION 2. This act shall take effect upon passage. |
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LC000131/SUB A |
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