A year after Windham voters soundly rejected a taxpayer-funded sewer system for the commercial district in North Windham, the Town Council is revisiting the subject.

Compared with last spring and summer’s public meetings, which saw concerned residents speak up against the council’s proposal to fund the multi-million-dollar project on the backs of residential taxpayers, recent discussions are drawing little in the way of a crowd. Despite the lack of public involvement, councilors would do well to remember the lessons learned last year when the public did weigh in on the costly proposal.

By a vote of 6,513-2,036, almost 70 percent of Windham voters rejected the proposed North Windham and Windham Center sewer project. The project, which would have piped sewerage from North Windham businesses as well as the school complex in Windham Center to the Portland Water District’s wastewater treatment facility in Westbrook, failed because it was too costly and relied exclusively on local taxpayers, most of whom wouldn’t see benefit from the system since they lived in outlying areas. That sunk the project, which was even more elaborate in earlier conceptions, from the get-go. Councilors, in their renewed discussions, need to remember residential taxpayers can’t carry the funding burden of a sewer project designed for the business community.

It seems from initial discussions, councilors have learned that lesson. The word “sewer” was barely mentioned for many months in council meetings after the voters’ beatdown last November, indicating councilors didn’t want to even mention the topic out of respect for the community’s wishes. With that feeling seemingly worn off, the new effort seems to be revolving around the Enterprise Development district in the Quarry Ridge Business Park owned by R.J. Grondin, which is behind the Ice Cream Dugout on Route 302. Initial discussions by town planners and councilors at recent meetings have focused on building a localized wastewater treatment system that can handle new and existing businesses in that specific zone designed to accommodate new businesses coming to town. Councilors are wise to recognize a water treatment facility – in whatever shape it takes – could be one more amenity that could draw more companies to the site and help the commercial-residential tax split. And that is a good approach as long as residential taxpayers aren’t on the hook.

At this early point in the discussion, we’re not sure what the cost impacts to the taxpayer would be. Hopefully, it’s none. An ad hoc committee is being formed to further study the proposal, as well as all options for paying for the system. Federal and state funding sources (although they, too, are taxpayer money in another form) should be explored, as should the use of impact fees and revenue from the multiple tax increment finance (TIF) district zones in North Windham.

With councilors discussing the charge of the committee Tuesday night, the search for an adequate wastewater system is steaming ahead, slowly and methodically, which is a good approach, rather than what seemed like a hasty process last time that dumped all funding responsibility on the laps of residential taxpayers.

Windham resident Ken Emerson, at the polls last year, echoed that widely held sentiment: “I have high enough taxes now,” he said. “I know the businesses need it up in North Windham, but I don’t think the taxpayers should be the ones to pay for it.”

With that said, however, North Windham is the area’s commercial hub, and a cost-effective sewer system that doesn’t rely on residential taxpayers makes sense for the town. Bringing forth any project that relies on residents would only lead, rightly, to another drubbing at the polls. And town leaders would do well to avoid what would be another exercise in futility.

–John Balentine, managing editor