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Water and Sewer Committee Minutes for August 10, 2006
Mr. Crone called the meeting to order at 5:30PM.
Mr. Wolff moved to approve minutes from the July 13th Meeting, Ms. Doyle seconded,
and the vote was unanimous.
The committee decided to wait to discuss the Hwy 80 Project until Mr. Williams arrives.
Mr. Crone said the estimate from 2004 for the Fort Screven Water Line of $400,000 to
$600,000 will not touch it now. He said the city needs to upgrade the plans and get
estimates on it. Mr. Ray Carter of HGB&D said prices on materials for that job have
increased 50% in the last three months.
Mr. Carter said He had asked Mr. Williams and the Fire Chief to look at the plans last
year in case replacing Fire Hydrants was needed. He requested the Chief review the
plans for adequate Fire Hydrants before the final estimate is done.
Ms. Fox asked Mr. Carter to fast track this so that the city would receive the estimate by
October.
Mr. Williams said they had a couple of mark ups on Rosewood Avenue but he is not sure
where Chief Sasser is on his review. Mr. Anderson said he would follow up with Chief
Sasser to see if he has finished his review.
Mr. Willams said he did not want to go with Grinder Pumps on the Hwy 80 project.
Mr. Keitzman said he had talked with Downer Davis about using Grinder Pumps this
morning and he asked Mr. Williams why he did not want to use them. Mr. Williams said
he worked for the City of Pooler and it took 3 people to maintain 300 Grinder Pumps.
Ms. Doyle said she has two neighbors that have grinder pumps that are broken all of the
time. She said the Grinder Pumps may be cheaper to start with but will be more
expensive in the long run. Mr. Williams said there will be a lot of commercial property in
this area and they wouldn’t want to set up residential grinder pumps there.
Ms. Effird said she doesn’t understand what dollar amount is associated with too much.
Ms. Fox explained that there is a situation at the water and sewer plant that will take
$100,000 out of the contingency fund and they don’t have the final approval from the
EPD which means there could be changes that will cost more on this project.
Mr. Williams said EPD is hoping to have their review completed in 2 weeks.
Mr. Crone asked Ms. Fox if she could find the money to fund this project. Ms. Fox said
she understood that the project was going to be a 50/50 cost share. Mr. Keitzman said he
didn’t understand that. He said he thought they would donate land for a pumping station.
Ms. Effird asked if the city could get a bond for this. Mr. Wolff asked if the city could get
a GEFA loan to cover this. Ms. Fox said the city has already raised the water rates to get
the balance to pay for the Butler Avenue water line.
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Mr. Crone asked Mr. Hughes is they could utilize that money for this project. Mr. Hughes
said the city could but it would cause audit headaches.
Mayor Buelterman asked if the city could borrow against the SPLOST funds like the
County is doing. Ms. Fox said yes.
Mr. Crone asked if this could move forward. Ms. Schleicher said the EPD may require
changes that will cost more. Ms. Fox said that because there was only one bid, that
HGBD had been asked to provide an estimate from the plan takeoffs and the estimate is
close to the bid amount.
Ms. Schleicher said the city has been working on the assumption that a 50/50 cost share
with property owners would be done to fund this project. She said the Aid to
Construction and Capital Cost Recovery money can be used for this. She said special
assessments can be made to all property owners that are affected by this.
Mr. Wolff asked if it had been decided to use a lineal ft number to get the assessment
amount. Ms. Schleicher said they are in the preliminary stages of planning but they are
using the number of property owners and they aren’t ready to disclose the amount yet.
Mr. Crone said everyone that is affected will have to cost share in this project.
The question what would happen if the property owners refused was asked by someone in
the audience. Ms. Schleicher said that would be a legal issue. Mr. Hughes said an
assessment would be like a lean on the property.
Mr. Solomon said when the city annexed that into the city they were supposed to provide
the water and sewer lines. He said now the property owners are expected to help pay for
this. Mr. Hughes said as far as the annexation goes the sewer plant that exists doesn’t
cover this part of the island. Mr. Wolff said there is no documentation that exists that
says the city will run water and sewer down Hwy 80. Mr. Hughes said he recalls the
documentation that exists concerning the water and sewer lines does not include those
properties.
Ms. Effird said the zoning on her property already exists so why is it called new
development because she wants to change the use. She said they were told they could not
independently put in septic systems. She said this has been going on for a year. She said
this is an overdue public project. She said they keep paying for this property but cannot
use it.
Mr. Keitzman said he was assured that there would be water and sewer put in when he
petitioned council over a year ago for the subdivision. He said they bought the property
based on that approval and he has now invested over 2 million dollars. He said he can’t
sell it because he can’t record the plat as long as there are no water and sewer lines
hooked up. Mr. Anderson said the subdivision regulations clearly state that the plat can’t
be recorded unless one of two things happen and they are the infrastructure has to be in
place or the cost of the infrastructure has to be bonded.
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Mr. Solomon asked that city personnel do everything they can to speed up this project.
Mr. Williams said the EPD has had the plans for 2 ½ months now.
He said the contractor is ready to start as soon as we can get the approval.
Ms. Fox said they needed to discuss the assessments.
Ms. Schleicher said there had been discussion that there would be cost share with the
property owners. She said a notification would be sent after the EPD final approval is
received. She said the assessments would be based on lineal feet or acreage. Mr. Crone
asked if everyone was aware of what the city was planning on doing.
Ms. Effird said when they signed on it was to cost share on the engineering plan for this
project. Mr. Crone said the project is more expensive than they initially thought it would
be.
Mr. Wolff said he remembered the meeting as the property owners agreed to do the
engineering and the city agreed to come back and do a cost share for the project. He
asked for the minutes to be reviewed to show what was said.
Mr. Wolff asked if they could move forward with the initial assessments and let property
owners know about this process and that the final number may be adjusted up or down.
Ms. Fox said we have to have a public hearing.
Mr. Crone said HGB&D said the materials are going up 15% every month.
Ms. Effird asked if all stakeholders will be notified about the public hearing.
Mr. Anderson said all property owners are notified at the addresses on the tax records.
Ms. Schleicher proposed setting up a dateline and sending it out so that everyone will be
aware of the process and that the assessments are coming.
Mr. Wolff moved that they proceed as Ms. Schleicher described, Ms. Doyle seconded,
and the vote was unanimous.
Mr. Williams said at this point they had installed 510 feet over on South Campbell and
they have approximately 200 feet left to do.
Mr. Williams gave an update on the Waste Water Treatment Plant. He said there has been
an extensive amount of flow and it’s not just the use. He said there has been severe
impact on the treatment plant as flow goes. He said they may go over the permit for flow
for July. He said they have a large amount of people coming onto the island and that
affects the flow. He said they have requested a waste allocation from EPD to expand on
their permit. He said the two sludge pumps that they have downstairs went out one right
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after the other. He said they are getting by on bypass. He said they are waiting for parts to
come in so they can be rebuilt.
Mr. Williams said he has contacted three distributors for aerators quotes. He said they
hope to get three replacements in the next couple of months.
Mr. Crone asked if we were in danger of the plant going down. Mr. Williams said the
flow and Ammonia levels are high but they have done everything they can to get the
ammonia levels down. He said they had removed a lot of sludge to get the levels down.
He said the plant looks better since they took all of the sludge out and he believes it will
hold its ground until they can get the new aerators in.
Mr. Williams said that July is the worst month and the flows will start tapering this
month.
Mr. Wolff moved to adjourn, Ms. Doyle seconded, and the vote was unanimous.
Respectfully submitted by Vivian Woods