Public Works

The Public Works Division is responsible for the maintenance and operation of the City streets and critical municipal infrastructure including the water treatment plant and wastewater treatment plant. This division is directly responsible for:

  Street Maintenance

The are 3 members of the street crew who are responsible for the maintenance of 40 miles of City of Snohomish streets and other right of way improvements. The crew typically will:

Ongoing maintenance activities include crack sealing which helps to extend the life of existing paving. The funding for street maintenance activities come from the City's general fund and includes money from gas tax collected in the city. The City keeps a sign and pavement marking inventory to guide inspection and maintenance efforts. It is estimated that annually 100 hours of city crew time is taken replacing street signs that are damaged by traffic mishap, vandalized, or stolen.

The City has established a street overlay program as part of its budgeting process.  The Council establishes the overlay list in the late spring and early summer. The City engineer recommends a preliminary list of streets and Council holds a hearing to determine which City streets will be on the final list.

The crew also responds to complaints about obstructions to sight distance and to sidewalk use by vegetation growing into the City Right of Way.

The repair and maintenance of sidewalks are the responsibility of the adjacent property owner by City Ordinance.

The City contracts with the State DOT to maintain traffic signals.

  Water Treatment Plant

The City water treatment plant is located approximately 16 miles northeast of Snohomish on the Pilchuck River. There is a dam at the plant location that diverts water to the treatment plant. The plant produces approximately one million gallons of water a day at full operation. This plant supplies water to the City's reservoirs feeding the South pressure zone. The south pressure zone includes those water utility customers located generally south of Tenth Street.

A fish ladder at the dam provides passage for significant runs of migrating fish species such as Steelhead, Dolly Varden, Bull Trout, and King, Silver and Chum Salmon. Constant maintenance of the ladder is required to keep it free of debris and sediment.

The Water Treatment Plant operator operates and maintains the plant with some help from the Water Distribution crew. The Treatment Plant operator maintains a  Class II Certification as required by state law and is responsible for producing water that meets state water quality standards.

The Pilchuck River often has high turbidity that makes treatment difficult or impossible at certain times of the year.

The Operator typically will:

  Water Distribution System

The Water distribution system delivers treated water to the City water utility customers. At present there are two pressure zones in the City with two separate sources of treated water. The south pressure zone is served by water brought from the treatment plant on the Pilchuck River via a 16-mile transmission line to the reservoirs in the City that serves the south pressure zone . It delivers water into two reservoirs that can store 6.5 million gallons of water for the south zone.

There are a significant number of water customers connected to the transmission line.

The north pressure zone is served by water from the Everett Water Treatment plant via transmission line number five which passes through the north part of the City's Urban Growth Boundary. A 2.7 million gallon water tower stores water for the north pressure zone.

The Water Distribution crew has a four-person crew that is responsible for operation and maintenance of 35 miles of pipe in the system.

 Typically the crew will:

  Wastewater Collection

The collection system consists of the sewer mains and lift stations that convey sewage to the wastewater treatment plant. There are 32 miles of sewer pipe, 10 miles of surface water conveyance and 14 lift stations in the system. Over seven miles of the system in the original townsite combines sewer and surface water runoff during storm events, which in turn effects the operation of the wastewater plant.

The four-person wastewater crew is responsible for maintenance and operation of the wastewater collection system, the wastewater treatment plant and surface water system. 

Typical crew duties are to:

Sidesewers from homes and businesses to the main are the property owner's responsibility to maintain and repair.

  Wastewater Treatment Plant

The wastewater treatment plant treats an average of one million gallons of wastewater a day. This can fluctuate to as many as 10 million gallons a day. The fluctuation occurs because in the old part of town the sewer and stormwater systems are combined and surface water from storm events combines with sewage increasing the volume of effluent received at the plant. The City has plans to separate the stormwater from the sewer in the old part of town that will make plant operation and maintenance simpler.

The City operates the plant under a NPDES permit issued by the State. The permit sets conditions on plant operation to ensure the Federal Clean Water Act is met. An important part of the operation is sampling and testing the quality of effluent discharged into the Snohomish River, which is done in the treatment plant lab.

The Wastewater Treatment Plant Operator maintains a Class II License as required by the State. 

Typically the crew will:

  Surface Water System

The Surface Water crew is responsible for maintenance of the surface water system including the storm drains and keeping the catch basins clean. The City will become more active in Surface Water Management as one part of our strategy to  address the Endangered Species Act in the City.  A portion of the City utility funds goes towards surface water management maintenance and operations. It is the funding from the surface water utility that pays for street sweeping, which is done by private contractor.

The crews annually:

   Regulating Cross Connections and Sewer Pretreatment

Personnel in this department are responsible for inspection and enforcement of the City's cross-connection and sewer pretreatment ordinances.

The cross connection regulations are meant to ensure that the City's water system is not accidentally contaminated.  Vacuums can occur that suck contaminated water into the system from an outside source creating a health hazard to water customers.

Water quality is also tested on a periodic basis by taking samples from the tap of randomly selected customers. In this way the system itself is tested for copper and lead content.

The sewer pretreatment regulations are intended to keep unwanted materials out of the sewer system. These materials are grease or other coagulants and toxic or heavy metal materials. The grease and coagulants can impair or bock side sewers, sewer mains and lift stations causing backups with the resulting inconvenience and possible health hazard to the property owner. Blockages also increase the cost of maintenance for the utility that will be reflected in sewer rates. Toxic and heavy metals are a source of hazard for utility workers. The requirement to remove such material from the wastewater treatment plant effluent into the Snohomish River can also result in very costly improvements to the wastewater treatment plant that must be borne by the utility ratepayers.