The Butler Area Sewer Authority's decisions regarding future tap-in permits are destined to become increasingly controversial, if Monday's Butler Township commissioners meeting is an accurate barometer.

At Monday's session, Cindy Davis, township zoning officer, was critical of BASA's current priority of giving available permits first to builders of single-family homes, rather than to developers of commercial and industrial buildings.

"BASA's reason for (giving)priority to residential is they think that's economic development," she said. "It's not."

She said a study had shown that residential development costs more in terms of municipal services than it results in taxes. Meanwhile, she said, commercial and industrial development brings in more revenue in taxes than it uses in services.

The dilemma BASA faces, with a strict state Department of Environmental Protection limit on new sewer tap-ins in effect, is how to balance those competing entities in a fair way to benefit the overall area economy.

Monday's discussion made clear that it is not going to be easy.

Thus, as the number of available tap-ins become fewer and fewer, it is reasonable to believe that grumbling will intensify.

Unfortunately, the biggest loser — not because of the grumbling but because of BASA's situation with the DEP — is going to be the BASA service area, which encompasses the City of Butler, East Butler Borough, and the townships of Butler, Center, Connoquenessing, Oakland and Summit.

New growth is going to be stunted, and everything from municipalities' tax coffers to the dreams of new-home ownership by families young and not so young will be hurt because of BASA's failure to meet the terms of a 2001 consent agreement with the state agency by the end of last year.

That agreement required BASA to resolve stormwater infiltration that in 2005 caused more than 31 million gallons of untreated sewage to overflow into the Connoquenessing Creek watershed — a situation BASA failed to correct and, in the DEP's eyes, failed to put forth enough effort to try to correct.

Consequently, it is possible that some people who had designs of living in the BASA service area will decide to build elsewhere, where getting something as seemingly routine as a sewer tap-in permit is obtainable without uncertainty.

Many people would recoil from the prospect of buying land and then facing the risk of not being able to build on it immediately because no more tap-ins will be available for an indefinite period of time.

BASA deserves criticism for, in the past, not striving to cultivate a more positive relationship with the DEP over the infiltration issue. BASA's situation wasn't enhanced by its failure to meet certain preliminary deadlines tied to the 2001 consent agreement — deadlines the DEP feels it was capable of meeting.

Meanwhile, the heavy-handed tactics of the DEP over the past year in regard to the local agency haven't enhanced its image.

As it turns out, BASA is an asset for the DEP, for the wrong reason. BASA has become the DEP's "poster boy" for the state agency's message to other sewer authorities that "you must comply with our wishes or else we will make life miserable for you and those you serve."

At Monday's meeting, the Butler Township commissioners authorized zoning officer Davis to send BASA recommendations on how future tap-ins should be allocated. Obviously, much of the township officials' concern is centered around the uncertainty that BASA's tap-in limits is imposing regarding the proposed Butler Crossing shopping plaza and office building that are planned near the Butler Commons shopping center.

Township officials can't be faulted for their concern. Such development means jobs and additional tax revenue.

As the opportunities for new development in the other BASA municipalities are thrust into limbo because of the dwindling number of available sewer taps, comments like those voiced on Monday are likely to become more frequent.

BASA can either ignore those concerns or make a genuine effort to calm the fears by working to "mend fences" with the DEP.

Presumably, the authority is busy trying to meet all stipulations tied to its new consent agreement with the DEP, but it must not be too busy to listen to, and react to, the concerns being voiced now and those that will be expressed in the future.

Butler Township has delivered an important message about what lies ahead. Hopefully, DEP officials, as well as BASA officials, were listening.

An area with so many growth possibilities shouldn't be stymied in the way this area has been this year, having lost virtually the entire construction season as a result of BASA's troubles.

Unfortunately, depending upon what does and does not transpire during the next couple of years, it could lose much more.