Trumbull County engineers are working to run sewer lines to about 700 homes in Hubbard Township, but the question still remains how the county will discard of the waste that comes to those sewer lines.

Sanitary Engineer Gary Newbrough says hundreds of homes, located in the south-west portion of the township, have failing septic systems and the county has been ordered to correct the problem through a 2007 legal agreement with the EPA.

"You flush your toilet, it goes into a tank in the back yard. The solids settle to the bottom of the tank, but the liquid just goes out into the ditch," explained Newbrough. "And that's where the EPA has a problem with that because, you know it's unhealthy, you've got that black water in the ditches, it's just a health nuisance."

Newbrough explains that the majority of the flow from that area would generally go to the City of Hubbard Waste Water Treatment plant, but the city does not have the capacity for the additional waste. Therefore, county engineers must determine what's 'Plan B.'

Newbrough says options include; sending the majority of the waste to the City of Youngstown. If that's not an option, then the county will either need to build its own small treatment plan in the area or upgrade Hubbard City's Waste Water Treatment plant to handle more capacity.

 "So I need a study to determine what's the most feasible method to service this entire area," said Newbrough.

Newbrough estimates, whichever route the county goes, the cost will not exceed $15 million. To help pay off that debt, the county will likely place an additional charge to the homeowner's sewer bill of about $25.

"The average sewer bill, let's say that's around $40, add in the $25 for debt, you're looking at about $65 per month," said Newbrough. "That's a lot better than these people having to upgrade their septic systems which will cost up to $20,000 a piece and you have to pay the entire thing in a lump sum."

The county has already finished about $60 million in sewer upgrades to about 15 other areas ordered through the EPA. This is the final and largest project in that agreement.

The date of completion was suppose to be 20202, however, the county is requesting to have until 2030 to finish this project.

"This is the last one on our list. Since it was the biggest one I saved it for last so that my departments could get a little more expertise in handling these sewer projects," said Newbrough. "Because of the county's excellent record in addressing 15 other consent decree areas in the county, they seem favorable to granting our request for this time expansion."