Citing discrepancies, city councilors table vault toilet approval

Libby City Council held off on giving its blessing to the construction of a proposed restroom for the Flower Creek cross country ski area after learning the facility deviated from its original proposal.

The council was expected to approve installation of a vault toilet at the site on Oct. 19. Instead, they tabled the measure after scrutinizing Ben Scott on the specifics of the proposal. Scott, who has a leadership role in the Kootenai Cross Country Ski Club, has spearheaded efforts to turn the Flower Creek area into a Nordic skiing hub.

Under questioning, Scott told city councilors that the toilet tank had been constructed and that organizers were still gathering the materials to erect a building atop the concrete container. That contradicted with the pre-engineered, prefabricated vault toilet concept that city officials said Scott initially pitched to them.

“That’s new news,” said Mayor Brent Teske. “It was always portrayed as a fabricated vault toilet. They come with their own engineering, prefabricated and ready to be installed toilets."

The discrepancy came to light after City Councilor Rob Dufficy asked whether the tank had been built. Scott affirmed that it had, and mentioned assembling the materials for the building atop the container.

Dufficy made the motion to table the proposal shortly thereafter, citing the difference between what was previously discussed and what Scott presented to the council.

“I am thoroughly confused,” he said. “This doesn’t sound like what we were talking about.”

His colleague on the board, City Councilor Peggy Williams, agreed with his assessment.

“This kind of changes the entire conversation,” she said.

Scott later apologized for the confusion. He told the councilors that when they previously discussed an engineered vault toilet, he thought they meant that he needed to submit design documents, which he had. The six pages of designs were made publicly available before the start of the Oct. 19 meeting.

Libby resident Tony Petrusha, who helped draw up the plans and also serves as the city’s parks manager, told the council their intention was to give officials the same information that would have received had they purchased an engineered, prefabricated vault toilet from a vendor.

But Teske said that deviated from the process the city had followed in the past. For those, the city received the engineering work from the vendor, submitted it to the state for approval and then installed the prefabricated structure with Helena’s endorsement.

“That’s just the process for doing this stuff and doing it correctly so we don’t have problems,” Teske told Scott and Petrusha.

After the meeting, Teske pointed to liability as a key part of the problem. When purchasing an engineered, prefabricated vault toilet from a vendor, the manufacturer assumes liability in the event of a collapse, for example. That would not be the situation were Scott, Petrusha and others to erect a structure of their own design at the site, he said.

“We went from a prefabricated, engineered vault toilet to an outhouse on a concrete pit,” Teske said during the meeting.

That description drew a sharp exchange between Teske and Petrusha, who defended the design work.

“This is not an outhouse on top of a tank,” Petrusha said.

“For lack of a better term, sir,” Teske replied.

Ultimately, city councilors voted 5-1 to table the motion, with Brian Zimmerman casting the lone nay. The board instructed Scott and Petrusha to run their proposal past the city engineer before returning.

City Councilor Kristin Smith also recommended the pair check with county health and planning officials. Dufficy requested specifications on the materials planned for the exterior of the aboveground structure.