A blistering state report on Baltimore’s ailing Back River Wastewater Treatment Plant made public Thursday detailed “systemic problems” plaguing the facility, including “failures at nearly every level.”
The report, produced by the Maryland Environmental Service, which took over the plant in late March, laid out a variety of infrastructure problems that have caused solid waste to build up in various parts of the sewage treatment process at the plant, leading to excessive releases of harmful bacteria and nutrients. But it also dove into problems with management, safety and staffing, blasting Baltimore Department of Public Works officials for a “lack of leadership” and providing a first look at a failing culture inside the facility, where problems first became public last summer.
In addition to a litany of mechanical fixes, the report recommended the hiring of several new employees, including an on-site safety manager, a training and certification manager, and a biosolids manager with two supporting staff members, focused on processing solid waste.
A spokeswoman for the city’s Department of Public Works emphasized that the issues at the plant pre-date Public Works Director Jason Mitchell, who started in 2021, adding that the department has a “renewed commitment to continuing to address these challenges, including governance, operations, and employee safety” under his leadership.
”We fully recognize the long-standing challenges impacting the treatment plant and implementation of solutions to remedy these issues are already underway,” spokeswoman Yolanda Winkler wrote in an email. “Several of them have already been addressed.”
In a statement, Maryland Secretary of the Environment Horacio Tablada wrote that the report “reflects conditions at the facility and provides useful information as we all work toward improving its performance. MDE is committed to working with MES and Baltimore City leadership to ensure that the plant comes into compliance with its permit.”
Meanwhile, recent reports from the city’s second wastewater plant — the Patapsco Wastewater Treatment Plant — indicate mechanical issues there are continuing to worsen, resulting in pollution overflows and calls from environmental groups for that plant to come under state control, as well.
In its report about the Back River plant, the Environmental Service found that all of the various shops in the facility were understaffed by 25% to 50%, with 50 vacancies in operations staff (about half of the team) and 44 vacancies across its other departments. Its report described a lack of succession planning and training for new managers, adding that “most managers at the facility have only been in their current positions a few years due to turnover.”
The plant has endured years of neglect, in part because of a failure to track the life-cycle of equipment in a centralized way, according to the report. The facility largely scorned preventative maintenance, perhaps due to understaffing, instead repairing machinery only after it broke. The plant’s automation also does not work, meaning that most equipment runs on manual mode and controls rigged to keep them from “tripping out.”
The Environmental Service report catalogued dangerous conditions at the plant, such as pervasive sludge spills, broken doors leading to birds and other wildlife “taking up residency” in buildings, electrical panels “left open and exposed,” insufficient lighting and rusting catwalks — even after an employee fell to her death through a deteriorating catwalk in Baltimore’s other wastewater treatment plant in 2019.
“Most of the facility’s valves, pumps, blowers, mixers, and controls are not functional. Pumps are plugged with trash, drains are clogged, and floors are covered with water or sludge,” read the report. “The lack of maintenance activities or funding for repairs has caused the staff to find many unnecessary workarounds to keep the plant operating.”
But the plant has received millions of dollars in investments in recent years, including nearly half a billion dollars for the Headworks Project, which made improvements at the beginning of the plant’s wastewater treatment process, including addressing a sewage bottleneck at the plant entrance. But even as the project was being unveiled, mechanical problems later in the process were becoming more dire. Eventually solid waste began to overwhelm various parts of the system, leading to the state takeover.
The report described a frustrated workforce with little supervision from plant management — and inadequate training. Staffers from the Maryland Environmental Service observed plant employees sleeping in their cars during the work day, and washing each others’ personal vehicles in exchange for “payment or free lunch.” They also observed apprentices at the plant training other apprentices, which the report dubbed a “recipe for failure.”
The city-run Back River Wastewater Treatment Plant in Dundalk, which is the state’s largest such facility, is supposed to discharge up to 180 million gallons a day of treated wastewater into Back River. But when problems arise, and sewage is only partially treated, the water flowing into the river is filled with dangerous bacteria and nutrients. (Jerry Jackson/Baltimore Sun)
“The Back River WWTP management team seems to have trouble disciplining employees when necessary; the thought of firing someone appears nonexistent,” the report reads.
The report also described infighting between different groups of employees, including the maintenance and operations staffs, adding that verbal and physical altercations between employees “have been observed on both the supervisory and subordinate level.”
When a team of about a dozen workers from MES arrived at the plant, following an emergency order from then-Maryland Secretary of the Environment Ben Grumbles, they encountered a persistent lack of urgency among staff, according to Thursday’s report.
“Based on what MES has seen in the roughly two months at this facility, the gravity of this issue does not seem to resonate with DPW staff as their response to the MDE order seems to have been met with a ‘business as usual’ approach,” the report read.
For example, at an initial weekly meeting on April 1, MES and city staffers discussed bringing potable water into the plant that would help with removing solid materials as needed. According to the report, the DPW director defended the city’s slow movement on the water line, stating that “it has only been seven days” since Grumbles’ order was issued.
“The MDE representative at the meeting reminded DPW that it had actually been 7 months of non-compliance,” the report stated.
When the issue came up again at a meeting on May 16, a DPW official said it “would get something started soon.” Discussions about how to streamline the city’s procurement process for Back River also appeared slow-moving, the report noted.
Meanwhile, the Department of Public Works director frequently did not attend meetings about the plant, and the head of its Bureau of Water and Wastewater employed a “defensive attitude,” which the report stated “does not bode well in expecting workers to be responsible and accountable.”
“There are many dedicated employees who want to see changes and bring the Back River facility back to being a world class facility,” the report said, “but they see no reason to jeopardize their livelihood and retirements in fighting the management team.”
Problems at the plant first came to light in August, when water quality monitoring from local nonprofit Blue Water Baltimore flagged high bacteria levels outside Baltimore City’s second plant along the Patapsco River. After the group’s findings, state environmental regulators conducted increasingly frequent inspections at both plants, and sued the city over the plants’ environmental woes in January. The city also faces a suit from Blue Water Baltimore.
In March, after a fish kill in Back River, inspectors returned to the plant again, and issued a report that Grumbles deemed evidence of the potential for “catastrophic failure” at the facility. If the city couldn’t bring Back River into compliance in 48 hours, the state would be taking charge of the effort, Grumbles said.
The city balked at Grumbles’ order, filing a court challenge that has yet to be adjudicated. The city is on the hook to pay for the MES efforts, according to state law.