The need for a new wastewater treatment plant has been called “crucial” many times over the past month, and although the project will be long and expensive, the funding process has to start somewhere.
The Albany City Council, following a presentation and recommendation from its engineering firm representative, took a first step at last week’s regular meeting to help get the project ‘shovel ready.’
Officials say that if water Plant A, which is capable of treating two million gallons of water per day and is over 50 years old, ever goes down for any reason for a long period of time, it could be catastrophic for the residents of both the city and county.
Toby Church, of Commonwealth Engineers, informing the council of a Kentucky Rural Water loan program, said “We are rolling the dice (with the old plant) every day.”
Church said a new plant will take five years to build, if you count the time it takes for funding to be in place, design work and actual construction, and said to the council, “Let’s get started.”
The engineer said the goal was to get 50 percent grant funding for the project, but beginning with a short term loan from KIA (Kentucky Infrastructure Authority), “You would get yourself shovel ready…and that would mean cutting down by a year” the time it would eventually take to have a new plant complete.
On a point system used for infrastructure funding projects, it would also help leverage additional grant monies to be shovel ready.
“We could (with the loan) be ready to start next year, although grant funding is not fully in place,” the engineer said.
Church recommended taking out a two or three year short-term loan at 4.55 percent interest, noting they could use grant dollars to reimburse the loan.
The loan would be for design of the plant, and a two year loan of $2.44 million now, considering inflation rates rising annually, may save money in the long run, Church said.
The total cost of the project is an estimated $25 million.
Councilman James Smith asked if the engineers had a ‘Plan B’ if the city doesn’t get enough grant money.
Church noted there were other options, saying KRW also has a long-term loan program. “We have lots of options to look at,” he said.
Church said if the city applied now, the funds would not be available until around mid-September. He added, however, that if they could start on the design for a 10 million gallon capacity plant and apply for funding, it would show the city would be shovel ready by December 31.
Following the engineer’s presentation and some discussion on the loan program, Councilman Junior Gregory made a motion to allow Commonwealth Engineering Company to submit a $2.44 million loan application with Kentucky Rural Water for the design work on a new water treatment plant.
The motion passed without opposition and more information on the status of the loan will be published as it becomes available.
The city council also held its regular meeting last Tuesday, June 3, and details on that meeting can be found on page 1.