Revisiting JSD’s financial issues

Published Aug 14, 2026 7:36 am

Jamestown sanitary district logo and map

Jamestown, CA — In the final segment of this three-part series, the leadership of the Jamestown Sanitary District (JSD) shared how it came to implement fees among the highest in the state to address its financial challenges.

According to district officials, JSD’s debt issues escalated around 2024. There was a lack of funding to replace aging infrastructure, including building a new plant. The issues culminated in an operational deficit where revenues were no longer able to cover operating and debt service costs.

Board leadership fractured during a volatile February 2025 board meeting that triggered both a split vote to scrap the Proposition 218 rate-increase process and the subsequent resignations of dissenting board members Rebecca Miller-Cripps, Jennifer Riddle and John Robbins.

Duke York and Judy Selby, the remaining members, temporarily left without a minimum three-member board quorum for voting purposes, were shortly joined by Amy Sardella, who applied and subsequently received a provisional appointment through the Tuolumne County Board of Supervisors.

York, a registered civil engineer and water and sewers major in college with 21 years of Tuolumne County experience in the private sector and over 23 years in the public sector, stepped into the role of board president after the board rift. Erica Banks and Robert Ditler, who joined that August, filled the remaining two vacancies.

Commenting on the previous board members’ mass departure, York said, “They (left) because they couldn’t stand the heat in the kitchen.” Reflecting on the rate increase pause, he acknowledged, “That put us in a real (financial) hole–at least three years–and some of it was because people were suffering (during the pandemic). We’re not going to get a Christmas card or appreciation (for not raising the rate fees).” However, he added, “We are a financial entity, and the majority of our ratepayers know we have to remain solvent.”

Beyond the rate increase, JSD faced challenges in its limited wastewater current treatment capacity that caused the board to, in December of 2023, implement an indefinite moratorium on new sewer connections that was in place for nearly three years before being recently lifted on July 30. The lifting of the moratorium, following infrastructure work funded by a $2.66 million State REAP 2.0 grant secured and administered by the Tuolumne County Community Development Department, successfully reduced groundwater infiltration and increased system capacity. Officials stated they would evaluate future connection applications on a first-come, first-served basis.

Upgrading JSD’s aging sewer infrastructure and a treatment plant still requires millions in debt-financed improvements. Nearly two-thirds of the improvements involve the projected associated costs of upgrading the district’s effluent (discharge) filtration process to meet Tuolumne Utilities District (TUD)-enhanced tertiary treatment standards for discharging wastewater into Quartz Reservoir.

York pointed out that TUD’s enhanced requirements for tertiary effluent standards came into place when TUD made its own recent system enhancements, which happened after JSD had already implemented–under requirements of its grant funding–a secondary wastewater discharge plan in its treatment plant upgrade. Some have argued that previous boards of stake-holding entities missed or ignored opportunities to coordinate their upgrading plans when the new treatment systems were being developed. A ripe time to discuss merging the utility districts could have been before both districts separately embarked on their plant upgrades.

While a full structural consolidation and complete merger with TUD has since been heavily explored, York said it was determined not to be viable as it would force TUD’s existing customers to assume JSD’s multi-million-dollar debt. So, instead, the two districts are coordinating under a regional operational agreement to meet regional disposal guidelines.

“TUD has been very accommodating during this period regarding (us) getting up to delivering tertiary and the state also knowing,” York shared. “We are doing everything in our power to upgrade. We have found some 50-50 (grant) money which is fantastic, and have increased some capacity due to the pipeline rehabilitation project.”

Moving forward

York emphasized that the district, which is considering every option and opportunity, looked at declaring bankruptcy but found that it would not remove the district’s debt but place it on the backs of the district’s customers. “If we go bankrupt and the state takes over, we are talking about a whole level of government that would cost our ratepayers.”

Because JSD cannot discharge its treated effluent into local creek beds and relies entirely on reclamation, York said plans are in the works for JSD’s updated tertiary infrastructure to include installing a recycled water truck fill station at the Quartz facility, enabling local commercial and agricultural sales of disinfected recycled water to generate non-ratepayer revenue.

Regarding development in the Jamestown area, timelines for sites exclusively tied to JSD will have to align with the district’s tertiary upgrade project as the district’s ability to issue new service hookups is directly tied to the plant’s capacity to safely process new volume.

Although York and Jill McClintock anticipate that the district will make the mandated upgrades that increase its capacity under the five-year restructuring plan, it is possible any limits could impact developers’ abilities to secure construction loan funding, obtain new connection permits, or clear any newly constructed building or dwelling for final occupancy.

One builder, Valley Vista Property Investments, which initially moved to sue JSD and its contracted engineering firm, Black Water Consulting Engineers, over a reduced unit connection capacity at its 230-home Golf Links Road subdivision, was able to move forward after reaching agreements to route sewage through TUD rather than JSD. Sometime after that, JSD was awarded state grants to expand the sewer system and update the wastewater treatment facility to resolve overall capacity constraints in the area.

If a parcel held a verified allotment or conditional “intent-to-serve” approval prior to the moratorium, it was already legally clear to connect to JSD’s wastewater system under the old new connection fee. District officials maintained there was not a backlog of developers and that the comment from one recent new developer inquiry about the district’s ability to provide connections to its sewer services was not deterred by the increase in the connection charge.

JSD can be reached through the district website at jamestownsanitartydistrict.com; via email at jsdistrict@mlode.com and by phone at (209) 984-5177.

Click here to view part one in the series and click here to read part two.