BETHEL — The Bethel Town Board approved changes to the town’s draft comprehensive plan Wednesday that call for new local laws governing future package wastewater treatment plants.

The revisions do not create new regulatory authority on their own. Instead, they recommend that the town adopt zoning provisions so that future package plants would continue to be operated by their developers or owners while also being placed within town-approved Wastewater Management Districts.

Existing package plants would not automatically be subject to the requirements of the new local law, which is still being developed.

“This Wastewater Management District would be under the auspices of the town and would provide ongoing town oversight of these facilities,” Supervisor Daniel Sturm said while reading the revised language.

The town would not own or directly operate the plants.

Sturm said the district would create a dedicated source of money that could be used if the town needed to send an engineer or inspector to investigate any concerns.

“The town itself will pay zero,” Sturm said after the meeting. “The developer has to pay every dime.”

Sturm cited the existing Swan Lake package plant, which operates under a transportation corporation approved in 2008, as an example of a system the town likely could not regulate retroactively through a newly created district.

Draft language for a possible local law says the town wants to strengthen the planning, review, financing, construction, inspection, operation and long-term management of package plants while supplementing existing state, federal and local requirements.

Sturm emphasized that the law remains in the early discussion stage and said developers and members of the public would have opportunities to review and comment on it.

The board approved the comprehensive plan edits so they could be incorporated into the draft before the final public hearing.

The public hearing will be held at 6:30 p.m. Wednesday, July 29, at the Dr. Duggan Community Center.

Town officials said they intend to begin work on the package plant law after the comprehensive plan is completed.