August 18, 2008 08:42 pm
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By Mark Millican and Charles Oliver
Sewerage no longer seems to be an issue for a new Whitfield County high school slated to be built in the Varnell area. On Monday, the Dalton Utilities board agreed to issue a letter of commitment to have a wastewater treatment plant nearby on Coahulla Creek in time for the school’s opening in 2011.
Dalton Utilities CEO Don Cope said Whitfield County Schools requested the letter.
“In order to facilitate us doing that, they are willing to pay for their infrastructure 100 percent — their main, their collection system back to that plant site — and furnish us $2 million in capital to help defray the costs of building the plant,” Cope said.
He said the estimated value of all the incentives the school system will provide is $3.1 million, at today’s prices for materials.
“It’s been in the works,” said school board chairman Tim Trew. “I’ve had full confidence it was going in the whole time and didn’t think we would have to have septic. We don’t want to be in the water treatment business.”
Asked where the $3.1 million will come from, Trew said he will wait to see what proposals are put forth by staff at the Aug. 26 board meeting.
“It’s all part of the SPLOST (Special Purpose Local Option Sales Tax) project,” he said. “This takes time, and it’s still part of the planning phase of the project. It’s not one man but a five-man board. We’ll look it over.”
“That’s great news,” said school board member John Thomas. “We had planned from the get-go that sewer would be up there.”
Thomas said he wants to see the letter of commitment “in writing” before commenting further.
The school system paid a $129,000 “application and capacity fee,” with Cope saying that money would be reimbursed if the project didn’t work out.
“They’re just like every other customer,” Cope said in late June. “They’re not being treated any differently.”
Dalton Utilities has planned a wastewater plant at the Coahulla Creek site for a couple of years. But Cope said last week he did not anticipate building that plant until another wastewater plant which is near completion on Mill Creek is earning revenue. That plant cost $8 million.
Dalton Utilities board chairman Norman Burkett noted the board approved plans to build three new wastewater plants, including the one on Coahulla Creek, in May 2006.
“We’ve been trying to move on this as conditions permit, and with the school system giving us this incentive, it just made a big difference,” Burkett said.
To get the wastewater plant running in time for the school opening, Cope said the utility would have to begin construction in the fall of 2010.
Conrad Easley, who leads a group called the Concerned Citizens of the Prater’s Mill Community and Whitfield County, said Dalton Utilities’ decision to provide sewage is “not a shock” and one he anticipated.
“I doubt we can prevent something like that from happening,” he said, even though he implied in June his group would challenge the proposed sewer treatment plant legally on the basis of serving the school. “Our group has never been opposed to county-wide sewage systems. But that still doesn’t make it the proper site. I’m sure there has been some pressure applied somewhere.”
Easley said he and many others in the county still oppose the site for the school “demographically and geographically,” contending the projected student numbers are not there and that the site will require “extra millions of dollars” to make it suitable.
“I’m concerned about the damage to Prater’s Mill and possibly to other areas because of the potential for flooding (of Coahulla Creek),” he said. “There are other factors besides sewage.”
Easley is president of Lake Francis Inc., a property owners association of the residential development across Highway 2 from the proposed school site.
“I’m sure there are some political allies working together, and we’ve got some, too,” he said.
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