Differing opinions on source of river algae during Liberty Hill town hall

LIBERTY HILL — An angry crowd faced off Tuesday night against city of Liberty Hill officials and engineers with their concerns that wastewater released into the South San Gabriel River by the city's treatment plant was still causing algae in the river.

Many people at the town hall meeting, including Stephanie Morris, said they were seeing excessive levels of algae along all stretches of the river, even though officials said that problems at the city-owned South Fork Wastewater Treatment Plant had been fixed.

Perry Steger, whose engineering firm Steger Bizzell designed the plant, told those gathered that algae was not present all along the river, only where creeks feed into it. He said the urbanization of the watershed and household lawn fertilizer were contributing to the nutrients that ran off in the river and caused algae.

"Are you implying that we are lying or just ignorant?," Morris asked Steger.

Other people asked what the city was doing to clean up the river sludge that was cited by the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality. The TCEQ issued a report in July saying an unauthorized dumping of sludge by the plant was to blame for algae that blanketed the South San Gabriel river downstream to Georgetown during the spring 2018. On Wednesday, the state agency said it had received two algae-related complaints about the river in the past two months.

RELATED: Report: Sludge dumping into river by wastewater plant caused algae

After the TCEQ issued its report, Liberty Hill sent the state agency a letter denying it had dumped sludge into the river.

Mayor Rick Hall said the city is meeting with the TCEQ on Feb. 1 to discuss the notice that the state agency's report about violations.

"If they tell us we have to clean it (the river), we will do it," said Hall. "We are willing to look at any option we can to not destroy the river but to save it."

Steger said Tuesday night that the wastewater treatment plant releases a small amount —11 ounces — of phosphorus into the South San Gabriel River per day and is working on reducing that amount. The city is allowed to release up to 5 pounds of phosphorus a day into the river, said Curtis Steger, who also works for the Steger Bizzell engineering firm.

Phosphorus, along with nitrogen, help support the growth of algae.

RELATED: Liberty Hill denies dumping sludge into San Gabriel River

Williamson County Commissioner Valerie Covey, who was at the meeting Tuesday, said the Liberty Hill issue was part of a much bigger discussion that needs to happen with other cities in the county about how to use wastewater.

Andy Barrett, a lawyer hired by the city, told the gathering Tuesday night that the river would naturally clean itself of the sludge.

David Bunnell, who lives along the South San Gabriel River, disagreed.

"We deserve an answer," said Bunnell. "Don't just say the river is naturally going to come back because if you guys follow the track record you have been doing, the river will never come back."Sludge is produced when solids are separated from liquids in the wastewater treatment process.

Curtis Steger told the crowd that Liberty Hill is building a reclaimed water pump station that will allow the Larkspur subdivision in the extra-territorial jurisdiction of Liberty Hill to use 50,000 gallons of the city's treated wastewater per day to irrigate their common areas. The subdivision was built with a kind of pipe that allows it to use treated wastewater for irrigation, he said. People in the construction industry also will be able to buy water from the station, he said.