YOUNGSTOWN — City Council on Wednesday will consider authorizing a final settlement to a high-priced wastewater improvement legal battle with the federal government.

The ordinance for council to consider would authorize the board of control to “accept the consent decree amendment” in the federal case involving the city, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and the Ohio Environmental Protection Agency on “a mutually agreed upon amendment to the combined sewer system long term control plan, which incorporates a ‘revised implementation schedule’ that will replace and supersede” a section of the original plan.

“This is a big one,” said Charles Shasho, the city’s deputy director of public works. “We want council’s support as we enter into final negotiations.”

The dispute was over a project to build a wet weather facility — a physical building that would be located near the city’s wastewater treatment plant. The facility would treat excess combined sewage during heavy rainstorms and then release the water.

The city filed a March 15, 2024, motion to modify a 2014 consent decree in federal court with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. As part of that 2014 decree, the city agreed to build a 100-million-gallon-per-day wet weather facility.

In recent years, the city has insisted the facility mandated by the federal government is too large and expensive.

The project’s initial estimate was $62 million, but is now more than $240 million, according to a Nov. 12 amended motion to modify the consent decree filing from attorney Terrence S. Finn of the Roetzel & Andress law firm in Akron, which represents the city.

The city asked Judge Christopher A. Boyko of the U.S. District Court’s Northern District of Ohio in that motion to permit the consent decree to be amended for the construction of a wet weather facility that could treat 80 million gallons of wastewater per day. The city hasn’t determined the cost of a smaller facility.

The federal government had previously rejected a reduction in the scope of the work.

But the two sides — as well as the state of Ohio — filed a joint motion on Nov. 25 for a 90-day extension to modify the decree stating they “believe that they have reached an agreement in principle.” Boyko granted the motion a day later.

The two sides — and Ohio — then filed another motion for a 60-day extension on Feb. 25 “to finalize the resolution of the consent decree modification motion.” The judge granted that extension a day later.

The two sides have until April 28 to reach a settlement.

After Wednesday, council doesn’t have a regularly scheduled meeting until May 21, which is past the April 28 deadline. City council met April 2 in executive session about the settlement.

Shasho said the details of the settlement will be revealed after Boyko approves it.

“It’s moving forward and we’re hoping for a good resolution on it,” Shasho said.

The board of control on March 26 approved a $2,964,094 contract with MS Consultants Inc. of Youngstown for preliminary design work to analyze and develop control measures for the wet weather facility.

The design work will take a couple of years, Shasho said.

Federal officials point out that work to the wet weather facility was to start Feb. 7, 2022, and final design work was to be done by this past July 29.

A schedule attached with Finn’s Nov. 12 court filing shows the wet weather facility would be finished by Sept. 7, 2030.

Finn also wrote that the Ohio EPA approves of the city’s proposal to substitute the 100-million-gallon facility with an 80-million-gallon one but “wants Youngstown to obtain additional flow data to further validate the model. Youngstown has agreed to do so.”

The federal EPA had originally ordered the city in 2002 to do $310 million worth of work, but it was negotiated down to $160 million in 2014 with the expectation it would be finished in 20 years.

The city has tried to get that price down further, but federal authorities have refused those requests, resulting in the reopened court case.

The schedule attached to Finn’s Nov. 12 filing has all of the work done by Oct. 1, 2035.

Also, the city insists in court filings and interviews that if Youngstown complied with the mandates now the cost would be about $380 million to $400 million — well over twice what it agreed to do 11 years ago.

The first phase was upgrades to the city’s wastewater treatment plant that have been completed.

The initial construction estimate was $37.3 million, but the city said it cost $70 million.

That work helped reduce the sewer overflows that would be part of the wet weather facility project, the city’s court filing states.

The wet weather facility was supposed to be phase two of the work.

The city approved $4.8 million on March 15, 2024, for design work for what was supposed to be the third phase. That phase is an interceptor sewer project to keep wastewater from 13 lines from flowing into Mill Creek Park’s Lake Glacier and Lake Cohasset.

Design work was supposed to start July 11, 2020, and construction was to begin April 5, 2024.

The city missed those deadlines, but plans a compressed schedule with that work finished by Oct. 16, 2032.

That phase was estimated to cost $47.7 million and will now cost $72.5 million to $87.2 million, according to city estimates.

The Department of Justice, which is representing the federal government in this case, on Nov. 12 repeated its demand for half of a $1,479,000 penalty from Youngstown to be paid to the federal EPA because the city “defaulted” on following through with federally mandated wastewater improvements. The penalty was first brought up in a Sept. 29, 2023, letter.

The city has refused to pay. The other half — $739,500 — could be sought by the Ohio EPA, which has declined to seek the penalty and has largely sided with Youngstown during the court proceedings.