Verified against county records · sources last read August 7, 2026 · rules change — confirm with the agent before applying
In Bradford County the body that issues your on-lot sewage permit is not a county department. It is the Bradford County Sanitation Committee, and Pennsylvania’s Department of Environmental Protection lists it as the Act 537 local agency for all 51 of the county’s municipalities. That single fact is the most useful thing anyone can tell a Bradford landowner, because it means one sewage enforcement officer network covers the whole county rather than fifty-one separate programs. It also means almost nothing about the permit is published, and this guide is honest about which parts those are.
No county-level sewage fee schedule is published, by the Sanitation Committee or by anyone else, and we are not going to invent one.
We checked the committee’s own site and its likely file paths, the county’s Forms, Apply For, Departments, Agencies and Document Center pages, both county fee documents, and the planning commission’s agendas and minutes. There is no permit fee, soil probe fee, percolation fee, inspection fee, renewal fee, transfer fee, planning-module fee or holding-tank fee anywhere on the public record. The one fee schedule the county does publish is the Bradford County Planning Commission Fee Schedule, effective January 6, 2026, and it has no sewage lines at all: minor subdivision $75 filing plus $20 per lot, major subdivision $150 plus $20 per lot, minor land development $200, major land development $400, two homes on one lot $60, municipal review $25 per review, plus recording at $21.50 with $2.00 for each additional page of plat. Those are subdivision fees, not septic fees, and quoting them as septic fees is the mistake to avoid. For what a system costs to build, see our cost guides.
Two Bradford municipalities do publish on-lot fees in their own codes, and they bind only themselves. Towanda Borough’s code sets a license fee of $75 for each project, lot or facility to be tested and a $15 percolation completion inspection fee, both amended in 1987 and revisable by resolution of council. Athens Township’s code sets the same $75 and $15, amended in 1987 and revisable by resolution of the supervisors. Whether those thirty-nine-year-old figures are still what those two municipalities actually charge is not something the record establishes, and neither figure tells you anything about what you will pay anywhere else in the county.
The Bradford County Sanitation Committee, through its sewage enforcement officers, for every municipality in the county.
The committee’s own website carries a two-sentence statement of purpose and a password-protected municipal reports area, and nothing else: no address, no phone number, no email, no fee schedule, no forms and no description of the permit process. Different Towanda addresses and a phone number for the committee appear on third-party sites, and we could not reconcile them against any document the committee itself publishes, so we are not repeating them here as though they were established. Ask your township or borough office for the committee’s current contact details. Every Bradford municipality works through the same committee, so your municipal office is both the shortest route and the one whose information is being kept current by someone accountable to you.
Do not confuse the committee with two similarly named organizations. Bradford County Sanitation Inc. is a private septic pumping company. The Bradford Sanitary Authority is a municipal authority for the City of Bradford, which is in McKean County, not here.
The county body you will deal with for land division is separate and does publish its details.
Bradford County Department of Community Planning and Mapping Services
North Towanda Annex No. 1, 29 VanKuren Drive, Suite 1, Towanda, PA 18848
Phone: (570) 268-4103 · Fax: (570) 268-4171
Email: bcplanning@bradfordco.org
Planning Commission meets the third Tuesday of the month at 6pm, Bradford County Public Safety Center
Bradford’s Subdivision and Land Development Ordinance routes soil suitability through the committee’s sewage enforcement officer, and no plan moves without it.
The ordinance’s pre-application requirements state that where on-site septic systems are applicable, soil suitability testing shall be required and verified by the local sewage enforcement officer of the Bradford County Sanitation Committee. The soils report submitted with a preliminary plan is reviewed by the same officer. The county’s own checklist goes further: all necessary DEP forms and Bradford County Sanitation Committee documentation must be approved by DEP or its assigned agency before a subdivision or land development application is formally submitted, and where municipal sewage is available a letter of sewer availability is needed instead.
Two practical notes. The ordinance is enforced throughout 47 of the county’s 51 municipalities, which is a different number from the committee’s 51, so check which regime your parcel sits under before you plan a split. And starting work before approval carries a fine of $500.00 per day under the ordinance’s enforcement remedies. The commission has ninety days from the regular meeting following the filing date to decide, filings close twelve days before a meeting, and the ordinance was amended in July 2026 by Ordinance 2026-02. The county received 97 subdivision and land development applications in 2025 and 57 in the first seven months of 2026.
Act 537 and 25 Pa. Code Chapters 71 to 73 apply in Bradford exactly as they do everywhere else, and they contain the deadlines worth knowing.
Two Bradford municipalities have their own permit timetables in their codes, both tighter than they sound: Towanda gives the officer seven days to issue or deny with a seven-day extension for supplementary data, and Athens is materially the same. Towanda requires 48 hours’ notice before a system is covered; Athens requires 72. Those are municipal ordinances and bind only their own municipality, which is the general rule in Pennsylvania and the reason we do not print one township’s number as though it were the county’s. Our installation guide covers the construction itself.
Bradford also drains to the Chesapeake Bay, which puts its on-lot systems inside a state and federal nutrient program. DEP’s countywide action plan snapshot for Bradford, published in December 2021 on 2020 progress data, projects septic nitrogen loading rising by 1,000 pounds a year against a county reduction goal of 878,000 pounds of nitrogen and 131,000 pounds of phosphorus. That is the pressure behind every planning module the committee reviews.
Pennsylvania issues no septic installer license, so there is no state lookup that tells you a Bradford installer is qualified. Competence is enforced at the permit, through the sewage enforcement officer’s inspections against 25 Pa. Code Chapter 73. For pumping companies the strongest public credential is registration as a residential septage hauler with DEP, which is a free filing rather than a vetting; we label it as exactly that. Home improvement contractor registration with the Attorney General and PSMA certification are separate things again, and neither is a septic license. See how we verify.
The Bradford County Sanitation Committee, for all 51 municipalities, according to DEP’s north-central region tabulation of municipal on-lot sewage service. It is a committee rather than a county department, which is why it does not appear in the county’s directory of departments and agencies.
No fee schedule is published anywhere on the public record, so ask your township or borough office, which deals with the committee routinely. The county planning fee schedule effective January 6, 2026 covers subdivision and land development only and has no sewage lines; do not budget from it.
Yes, where on-site septic is applicable. The county’s subdivision ordinance requires soil suitability testing verified by the sewage enforcement officer of the Bradford County Sanitation Committee before the pre-application stage is complete. All DEP forms and committee documentation must be approved before a plan is formally submitted, and starting work before approval carries a $500 per day fine.
No county sewage ordinance exists, and there is no county-level pumping frequency. Individual municipalities may adopt sewage management ordinances of their own, so the answer for your property is a municipal question. We have not surveyed all 51 and will not imply that we have.
Seven days for a conventional system once your application is complete, under 25 Pa. Code section 72.25(b). An incomplete application must be flagged in writing within seven days, and the agency then has fifteen days from receiving the missing information. Neither the committee nor the county publishes a turnaround figure of its own.
Sources: Pennsylvania DEP, NC Region Municipal Onlot Sewage Service Depiction (updated 3/1/15); Bradford County Sanitation Committee website; Subdivision and Land Development Ordinance for Bradford County, Pennsylvania (2003, as amended July 2026 by Ordinance 2026-02); Bradford County Planning Commission Fee Schedule, effective January 6, 2026; Bradford County Department of Community Planning and Mapping Services application checklist; Bradford County Planning Commission agendas and minutes, October and November 2025 and July 2026; Towanda Borough Code Chapter 239 and Athens Township Code Chapter 126; PA DEP, Countywide Action Plan Snapshot, Bradford County, December 2021. All read August 7, 2026. 25 Pa. Code Chapters 71, 72 and 73.
Ground conditions, verified providers and the wider picture: Bradford County septic hub. How permitting works elsewhere in the state: Pennsylvania permit guides.
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