The Brown County Water Improvement District #1 will soon begin rehabilitation of the district’s water treatment plant after accepting a bid for the project at their Tuesday board meeting.
The board approved a bid of $1.96 million from a Graycon for the project to make several repairs to the older of the two treatment plants the district operates. Graycon was also the contractor for the district’s newer Micro-filtration treatment plant.
“This project also includes a new 1 million gallon storage facility on the hill above the treatment plant,” said BCWID General Manager Dennis Spinks. “This will be a concrete tank similar to the tanks that we have.”
Spinks said the rehab project will begin as soon as possible.
The BCWID board also approved acceptance of the district’s newer Micro-filtration plant after it “met and surpassed the contractor requirements” after recent tests. Spinks said that although the plant has been in operation for about 4 years, the district has had to rely on the older plant for the majority of the treated water sold because the new plant has not been producing the specified amount of treated water.
After several years of adjustments, the plant now meets and can exceed the treated water demand of customers. District officials have been waiting for this to move forward with the needed repairs and rehab of the older treatment plant.
The plants provide treated water from Lake Brownwood to many water providers in the county including the city of Brownwood who then sell it to residential and commercial customers.
In other issues discussed at Tuesday’s board meeting:
-The board approved the sale of 3 acres of property to MP2 Energy to build a backup electric generator for the electric grid.
-The board reviewed bids to drill a test well in the search of alternate sources of water in the area. With the low bid at $700,000, the board tabled the issue and is going to reevaluate the plan before moving forward. They may take further action at next month’s board meeting.
-The board accepted the resignation of their general council Bill Bell after 33 years of service to the district. A reception was held for Bell and the board is considering a replacement.
