The one wart we knew of when we purchased the property was water availability. A quick search of county records showed they’d had a water permit application on for decades. But no movement. Ostensibly ongoing tribal disputes related to salmon fishing had frozen anything related to water in the courts.
In the 1960’s Yodelin started out as a planned ski community. But there was an avalanche in the late ‘60’s that took a lives and cabins. It took the wind out of the sales, financially and emotionally. A bunch of plots were condemned. A few owners were able to move their cabins to new locations. But all the infrastructure was in place throughout. Water mains on every street. Power and phone in the street.
Originally, the community had a surface spring water system above on the hillside above. Based on the number of attached dwellings, the county deemed the system too sketchy and dangerous from a health standpoint. They were forced to develop a true water system with a well and storage tank, at appreciable expense to the current owners.
When that system was built, it was certified for up to 40 hookups. That’s how many it has today. We knew of several other owners in the area who built within the last decade. They installed water storage tanks in their basements, and pay for potable water trucked in after the snowmelt to replenish each year. That was my plan-of-record too. As I started to research the logistics on that route, I discovered a few surprises:
It costs more (a lot more) to haul the water to Yodelin than the water itself costs. Fifty bucks for water, and $1000 for delivery. Ouch. No water delivery outfits anywhere near the area. As I grappled with the cost of hauling and storing water, I began toying with gathering rain/snow water off the roof and storing it. I confirmed in writing with the county that you do NOT need a permit to gather rainwater off your own roof for personal use. We get plenty of snow and rain up there -- and it’s free! I did tons of research and reading on the internet to figure out who was doing such things. Water treatment and storage are reasonably tractable problems that have a number of good, viable solutions. And rainwater catchment systems for roofs have been solved, too. But doing it all in an alpine environment with tons of snow per square yard on a roof has not been solved. Snow eats gutters for breakfast. I went as far as designing a heavy-duty, stainless steel, reinforced gutter, and figured I could install melting strips in it and on the roof. But that’s a lot of cost and invention on a very limited budget. Always looming in the back of my head was the thought, “It might work.” On a limited budget, I need better chances than might.
I set out to uncover everything I could about the water situation, on the Internet, on the phone, and an email. There’s a great deal of folklore about Yodelin and water system. The first thing I learned is don’t settle for hearsay, rumor or legend. Go to the source: The Yodelin water system commissioner. The State Dept. of Health. Chelan County. My timing was impeccable.
There was a court ruling that allowed new water rights to be granted for a limited number of applicants, and since the Yodelin system had its application on file for so long, they were invited to participate. Aspect consulting was contracted by the state to shepherd a few handfuls of applicants through the process for obtaining water rights.
As of April 2017, the system is in the final stages of obtaining additional “water rights”. Aspect consulting is in the final strokes of that process. When that is done, we also have to have a state-certified water engineer certify that our system has the capacity to service additional hookups. They have already contracted with the same engineering firm that designed the original system and that should be completed before early summer. After our “rights” and “capacity” are in place, I should be able to hook-up to the system (after paying a nominal $15K hook-up fee -- the same amount all of the original owners paid to build the current system). The good news is that the water main is already in the road at my property, so it should be a simple process.
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