Restaurants Have Little Time for Grease Ordinance

(posted May 20)

Speedway's Town Council is giving restaurants little time to respond to the fats, oil and grease (FOG) pretreatment Ordinance.

Ordinance 1113 will require pretreatment (grease traps) to prevent FOG from clogging the sewer lines and filtering system at the waste water treatment plant.

According to Doug Skaggs of B W Plumbing, it could cost a business between $2,000 and $10,000 depending upon the scope of services needed to separate the line to prevent the grease from going into the sewer line.

Skaggs explained the ordinance is designed to save the town money because it requires lines to cleaned to rid of grease build up. He said the grease takes on an acidic nature if it remains in the pipes over 20 to 30 years. The grease gels so hard in the lines that the town's water jet truck can barely blow a hole through it.

It was discussed at the May 12 town council meeting that the ordinance needed to be passed at the May 28 meeting, which  would require a suspension of the rules to have first reading and second reading at the same meeting. The normal procedure would place the second reading and adoption at the June 9 council meeting. The ordinance becomes effective upon passage with no grandfather clause to existing businesses.