Published: November 25, 2007 12:07 am      

Council prepares to sell bonds to replace aging wastewater plant

GREENVILLE — It has been no secret that the City of Greenville has been wanting to replace and/or expand the current Wastewater Reclamation Center. City officials had been investigating the possibility for some time.

The biggest question has been how to pay for such a huge project. That answer may come Tuesday, as the City Council is scheduled to talk about the issuance of $20 million in bonds, which would greatly increase the city’s debt for the water and sewer system.

The Council is scheduled to discuss the issue during a work session, starting at 5 p.m. Tuesday in the Municipal Building, 2821 Washington Street. The Council may then act to hire firms to serve as financial advisors and bond councils for the project during the regular session, scheduled for 6 p.m. Tuesday.

The Wastewater Reclamation Center is in need of an upgrade in order to comply with the requirements of the city’s wastewater discharge permit and to meet projected growth.

The plan has called for the expansion from the current treatment capacity of 4.23 million gallons per day (annual average) to 6 million gallons per day (annual average).

And yet Director of Public Works Massoud Ebrahim has said expanding the capacity of the plant — which was built in 1953, expanded 10 years later and received its last upgrade in 1980 — is not as important an issue as the process and equipment at the plant. The processing equipment which is more than 25 years old and Ebrahim said it needs a complete replacement.

Ebrahim said the trickle filter method which the plant uses to treat wastewater effluent before discharging it back to Lake Tawakoni is also obsolete and that an actuated process would not only be more efficient, but better suited to deal with future growth.

The City of Greenville, now at 26,000 people, is predicted to be a city with a population of almost 42,000 in about two decades. There is also the need to prepare for the arrival of the Cobisa plant in the next few years.

The City of Greenville applied for and was approved for a $20 million bond through the Texas Water Development Board. First Southwest Securities has provided the Council with five scenarios over what would happen to the city’s existing $29.9 million water and sewer system debt once the bonds are sold.

Should the city not decide to defease — or retire some of the existing debt ahead of schedule — the bonds would increase the water and sewer system debt to $57.1 million. Under the scenarios, the city could pay off some of the bonds ahead of time and lower the total water and sewer system debt to between $50 and $54 million.

Tuesday, the Council is scheduled to consider hiring the firm of Vinson and Elkins as bond counsel for the project and First Southwest as financial advisor.