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THE COUNTY OF CAROLINE |
| DEPARTMENT OF PUBLIC UTILITIES | |
“Committed
to Service, Dedicated to the People.” |
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THE COUNTY OF CAROLINE |
| DEPARTMENT OF PUBLIC UTILITIES | |
“Committed
to Service, Dedicated to the People.” |
Caroline County Regional Wastewater Treatment Plant
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| Dawn Wastewater Project News Dawn Wastewater System Expected to Serve First Customers in May |
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| The Dawn Community Wastewater System
is well over two thirds complete. Only a handful of tanks remain to be installed.
Installation of the force main along Richmond Turnpike continues, with Dawn Boulevard to
follow. Another crew is busy installing individual lines from the street to each tank.
Additionally, an electrician is wiring the pump in each tank to the disconnects that were
recently installed at each home. The treatment plant has been completed and electricity has been extended to the plant. Preparations are being made before the final task of connecting homes can begin. When a home is connected, a crew will locate the drain pipe outside of the house and disconnect the pipe from the septic tank. They will then extend that pipe from the home to the new step tank. The pump will be activated and the home will begin receiving service. I t is anticipated that two or three homes will be connected each day. |
Crushing of the
old septic tanks will follow sometime thereafter, and before final completion of the
project, the dirt will be removed and grass restored. Crews may be at each home several
times as they continue the multiple steps of the project. |
| Dawn Wastewater Project News Ceremonial Groundbreaking Held on November 19th |
The Caroline County Board of Supervisors hosted a ceremonial groundbreaking for the Dawn Wastewater and Housing Rehabilitation Project on Saturday, November 19th. Construction on the project is expected to begin in January.
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| Dawn Wastewater Project News County Expects to Break Ground on Project in Fall 2005 |
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| As chronicled in earlier editions of
The Caroline County News and in local newspapers, many residents in the Dawn area of the
County suffer from failing or unreliable drainfields due to poor soils in the
area. Some even lack indoor plumbing entirely and live in substandard homes
that do not meet current buildings for safety. In the fall o 2005, the Dawn Wastewater Project will begin to change all of that. Phase I of the project, which County officials except to be under construction by October 15, will connect approximately 180 homes and businesses to a safe, reliable wastewater treatment system operated by the County. At approximately the same time, work will begin on rehabilitating approximately 25 substandard hoses in the area. In addition to installing indoor plumbing, these substandard houses will either be demolished and replaced or rehabilitated and brought up to appropriate building code standards. Significant developments in the project since the last edition of The Caroline County News include:
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| Dawn Wastewater Project News Project Engineer Selected; Community Meeting Held February 5 |
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| The Dawn Wastewater Project continues
to move forward with a couple of significant events slated to occur in the coming weeks.
On February 3, the Board of Supervisors selected the engineering firm of Arcadis FPS to
design the decentralized wastewater treatment system(s) for the Dawn community. As part of
its work, the engineer will also determine how many individual systems are needed, which
homes and businesses will receive service initially, finalize the project cost and
ultimately prepare a Request for Proposals (RFP) to build the sewer system. As indicated in previous articles, the new decentralized system is a departure from previous efforts to provide public sewer service to the Dawn area. Past attempts to obtain competitive grant funds for a conventional wastewater system proved unsuccessful. The new “decentralized” systems are significantly more flexible, much |
less expensive and much simpler to design and construct than
traditional wastewater systems. Decentralized systems can serve a handful of customers to
several hundred and do not require an elaborate treatment system or a large number of
customers to be economically feasible. The greatly reduced expense will allow the County
to build a sewer system in Dawn without relying on competitive grant applications that may
never come to fruition. Full support from the Dawn community, however, is still needed to
make the project a reality. A community meeting hosted by Reedy Church District Supervisor Maxie Rozell was held February 5 at the Dawn Progressive Association. Citizens were given the opportunity to meet the new engineer and hear the latest on design plans. |
| Dawn Wastewater Project News Dawn Wastewater Project Continues Forward |
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| Important work on the Dawn Wastewater
Project continues during the spring months as the County moves toward the installation of
a much-needed public wastewater system. Arcadis FPS, the County’s engineering consultant, continues to work with staff to determine which homes and businesses will be served during Phase I of the project to take full advantage of the available state and federal funding. The County hopes to obtain more grant funds for future phases to connect additional homes and businesses. The County has received notice from State Health Commissioner Robert B. Stroube that its request for variances from the state sewage handling and disposal regulations for the Dawn project has been approved. These variances were required to allow the County to utilize decentralized wastewater system technology, which is relatively new in the Commonwealth of Virginia. In granting the request, Commissioner Stroube indicated that the variances “establish the foundation for a unique and innovative pilot project in which Caroline County, as a governmental entity, will manage and provide decentralized wastewater services under a performance based regulatory program”. Commissioner Stroube also commended Caroline |
County for “its willingness to seek
out innovative solutions to the associated problems of inadequate plumbing facilities and
inadequate wastewater treatment and disposal facilities.” |
| Dawn Wastewater Project News County Receives $500,000 in IPR Set-Aside Funds from State |
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In a key development,
the Board of Supervisors recently approved the preliminary engineering report (PER) for
the Dawn Wastewater Project. Construction of the first phase of the project remains slated
for spring 2005. |
homes during subsequent phases of the project if
additional funding can be found. Not included in the initial funding, however, is the cost of rehabilitating the 29 homes in the service area that currently lack indoor plumbing. To cover this cost, the County applied for $1,000,000 in community development block grant funds from the Virginia Department of Housing and Community Development (DHCD). While the grant application was not successful, the County did receive $500,000 in Indoor Plumbing Rehabilitation (IPR) set-aside funds from the state to help fund the rehabilitation portion of the project. Local officials also continue to work with DHCD staff to find funding sources for the project, and the County remains hopeful that indoor plumbing can be installed in as many of the 29 homes as possible. Later this month, teams are expected to begin visiting homes in the Phase I service area to ask residents to formally commit to hook up to the system. The engineers will also begin the design for the system in the coming months. |
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This page created by Joshua Carson.
