Logan County Families Fear Foreclosure as Water System Fails

By Jaclyn Allen | Denver7

Sage Pointe residents told Denver7 Investigates their fight is part of a bigger rural infrastructure problem.

STERLING, Colo. — Just west of Sterling, Colorado, the Sage Pointe neighborhood is in crisis.

Families say their private water and sewer system is failing, and they are being asked to foot a skyrocketing bill.

“There’s roughly 90 plus homes here,” Jason Sanders told Denver7 Investigates. “We had no awareness of it, no disclosure of it, but now we’re having to front the bill.”

Sanders said his family was never informed that the community operates on its own well water and septic system when he purchased his home in 2023. That system is currently under a state cease-and-desist order due to past code violations.

Heather Gage, secretary for both the Sage Pointe HOA and the Sage Pointe Metropolitan District board, said the original wastewater treatment plant didn’t meet code and was shut down last year after the order came.

“When the cease-and-desist happened, we shut down the old system and brought in a temporary treatment plant,” she said. “We’re meeting compliance better than we have in 20 years.”

The Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment (CDPHE) has allowed the rented system to stay in use while the board works on a long‑term fix, but that temporary solution is expensive. Residents’ combined water and sewer rates jumped last year from $200 to $400 a month. The board is set to approve another rate increase during a meeting Tuesday night.

“We don’t know what that rate’s going to be until the meeting tonight… unfortunately, the wastewater system is ours,” Gage said. “It breaks my heart, to be honest with you, because I know that there are some members of our community that are not going to be able to afford the rates that we’re looking at to keep the wastewater treatment facility operating.”

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