No unauthorized person(s) shall uncover, make any connections with or opening into, use, alter, or disturb any public sewer or appurtenance thereof without first obtaining a written permit from the Town.
There shall be two classes of building sewer permits: for residential and commercial service producing only domestic wastewater (or sanitary sewage) as defined herein, and for service to establishments producing industrial wastes and commercial facilities that produce a process wastewater effluent or discharge. Commercial facility may include but not be limited to: office buildings, medical centers including dental facilities, restaurants, food service facilities, hotels, malls, retail stores, farm land, multifamily housing buildings, warehouses, septage haulers, and garages. In either case, the owner(s) or agent shall make application on a special form furnished by the Town. The permit application shall be supplemented by any plans, specifications, or other information considered pertinent in the judgment of the Town. A permit and inspection fee, as established by the Town Council from time to time, for a residential or commercial building sewer permit shall be paid to the Town at the time the application is filed. The permit and inspection fee for industrial service and commercial facilities that produce a process wastewater effluent or discharge shall be based on the actual cost to the Town.
A. 
The Town may stipulate special conditions and terms upon which the industrial user permit is predicated, and this may include, but shall not be limited to, the following:
(1) 
Limitation on quantity, rate of discharge and wastewater characteristics.
(2) 
Installation of flow monitoring and sampling facilities.
(3) 
Requirements for monitoring programs (including monitoring waivers approved in accordance with § 158-44, Monitoring), including flow measurement, wastewater sampling and analysis and schedule for reporting and submission of data. The Town will review the data furnished and has the authority to request additional information if required.
(4) 
Pretreatment requirements, including schedules of compliance and progress notification.
(5) 
Special fees and service charges.
(6) 
Wastewaters discharge peak rate and volume over a specified time period.
(7) 
Chemical analyses of wastewaters.
(8) 
Information on raw materials, processes, and products affecting wastewater volume and quality.
(9) 
Quantity and disposition of specific liquid, sludge, oil, solvent, or other materials important to sewer use control.
(10) 
A plot plan of sewers on the user's property showing sewer and pretreatment facility location.
(11) 
Details of wastewater pretreatment facilities.
(12) 
Details of systems to prevent and control the losses of materials through spills to the municipal sewer.
(13) 
Other requirements to comply with federal, state and local regulations.
B. 
Discharge permits shall not be transferred or reassigned.
C. 
A permit expiration date can be extended and will remain enforceable if the permit is not reissued provided the permittee complies with the following:
(1) 
The permittee has submitted a complete permit application at least 60 days prior to the expiration date of the user's existing permit; and
(2) 
The failure to reissue the permit prior to expiration of the previous permit is not due to any act or failure to act on the part of the permittee.
(3) 
The extension shall not exceed one-year period or 365 days.
D. 
It is the responsibility of the permittee to ensure that all the characteristics of the wastewater have been fully disclosed. The permittee shall certify that there are no material omissions or misrepresentations in the application hereto and that neither the application nor the attached information contains any untrue statement of a material fact or omit to state any material facts necessary to issue a wastewater discharge permit. Permittees shall be subject to the remedies, including penalties for failure to disclose.
All costs and expenses incidental to the installation, maintenance and connection of the building sewer shall be borne by the owner(s). The owner(s) shall indemnify the Town from any loss or damage that may directly or indirectly be occasioned by the improper maintenance or installation of the building sewer. Furthermore, the building owner is responsible for all costs of maintenance, cleaning and repair of the lateral connection from the sewer main to the building. All costs and expenses incidental to the installation, maintenance, cleaning and connection of the building sewer shall be borne by the owner(s). The owner(s) shall indemnify the Town from any loss or damage that may directly or indirectly be occasioned by the installation and maintenance of the building sewer, including the proper installation, maintenance and cleaning of backflow preventers (check valve) and building laterals where the building lateral fails or develops a blockage.
Unless specifically authorized by the Town, a separate and independent building sewer shall be provided for every building, except where one building stands at the rear of another on an interior lot and no private sewer is available or can be constructed to the rear building through an adjoining alley, court, yard, or driveway, the front building sewer may be extended to the rear building and the whole considered as one building sewer, but the Town does not and will not assume any obligation or responsibility for damage caused by, or resulting from, any such single connection aforementioned.
Old building sewers may be used in connection with new buildings only when they are found, on examination and testing by the Town, to meet all requirements of this chapter. All costs of such testing and inspection, including any pipeline video recording [see Town Public Works Department (PWD) Construction Standards for testing requirements], shall be borne by the owner(s).
The size, slope, alignments, materials of construction of a building sewer, and the methods to be used in excavating, placing of the pipe, jointing, testing, and backfilling the trench shall all conform to the requirements of the Town's Building and Plumbing Codes and the appropriate sections of the Town's standard specification for sewer construction. In the absence of code provisions or in amplification thereof, the materials and procedures set forth in appropriate specifications of the latest edition of the ASTM Water Environment Federation Manual of Practice No. 9 shall apply.
Whenever possible, any building sewer shall be brought to the building at an elevation below the basement floor. In all buildings in which any building drain is too low to permit gravity flow from the sanitary facilities to the public sewer, sanitary sewage carried by such building drain shall be lifted by an approved means and discharged to the building sewer at the owner's expense.
No person(s) shall make connection of roof downspouts, foundation drains, areaway drains, or other sources of surface runoff or groundwater to a building sewer or building drain which, in turn, is connected directly or indirectly to a public sanitary sewer.
The connection of the building sewer into the public sewer shall conform to the requirements of the Town's Building and Plumbing Codes and other applicable rules and regulations of the Town or the procedures set forth in appropriate specifications of the ASTM and the Water Environment Federation Manual of Practice No. 9. All such connections shall be made gastight and watertight and verified by Town inspection. Any deviation from the prescribed procedures and materials must be approved by the Town before installation.
The applicant for the building sewer permit shall notify the Town when the building sewer is ready for inspection and connection to the public sewer. The connection and testing shall be made under the supervision of the Town.
All excavations for building sewer installation shall be adequately guarded with barricades and lights so as to protect the public from hazard. Streets, sidewalks, parkways, and other public property disturbed in the course of work shall be restored in a manner satisfactory to the Town at the expense of the owner.
A. 
Any person proposing a new discharge into the system or an increase in the volume, beyond limits previously permitted, or in the strength or character of pollutants that are discharged into the system shall make application to the Town at least 60 days prior to the proposed change or connection. No person shall operate with such an increase or change without first having received a modification to his permit. Proposed new discharges from residential or commercial sources involving loading exceeding 50 population equivalents (5,000 gpd) or any extensions of the sanitary sewer collection system with eight-inch pipe or larger, including manholes, etc., any new industrial discharge, or any alteration in either flow or waste characteristics in industrial discharge may require approval by the New Hampshire Department of Environmental Services (NHDES).
B. 
In the event a permittee intends to cease to discharge from a regulated process or plans to disconnect from the wastewater system, the Public Works Director must be notified no later than 60 days prior to commencement of any action by the permittee. The notification shall provide a closure management plan that includes the following information, as a minimum:
(1) 
Date of planned disconnect;
(2) 
Methods of disposal of regulated process tanks, chemicals, sludges, plating wastes, cleaning solutions;
(3) 
Methods of cleaning tanks, barrels or other vessels containing regulated pollutants;
(4) 
Names of carriers and ultimate disposal site(s) of the regulated pollutants and the EPA permit numbers for transportation of the wastes, if a permit is required by the EPA.
C. 
The permittee shall be responsible for all discharges to the wastewater system and shall not be disconnected until the Director or his/her designee has determined the permittee has disposed of the regulated wastes in a proper and safe manner and has requested termination of the discharge permit in writing. The permit shall be terminated in accordance with § 158-59C.
All contractors who apply for a permit for making excavation within the limits of the public streets of the Town for the purpose of laying private sewers must comply with the following requirements:
A. 
Applicant shall post a surety bond in an amount sufficient to cover the cost of the project as required in the permit to work in the Town right-of-way (ROW) as issued by the Public Works Department (PWD), Highway Maintenance Division.
B. 
All work performed by contractors under this permit shall comply with all Town regulations.
C. 
All contractors will cause the excavation to be properly guarded at all times for the protection of the public.
D. 
All contractors will properly make all connections and joints in every sewer and will indemnify and hold harmless the Town of Merrimack from any damage or cost for which it may be liable by reason of injury resulting from neglect, carelessness, or incompetence in constructing, repairing or connecting any private sewer, or proper fencing or lighting any excavation or obstruction, or in performing any other work connected therewith.