|
Developers’ requests for sewer service may tax TWSA capacity
By Carey King
Should requests for sewer service from two Cashiers-area developers be granted, nearly two-thirds of the community’s planned sewer expansion would be spoken for.
Blue Ridge Estates LLC has requested a flow of 25,185 gallons per day for a planned development on 13 acres near Hardee’s Restaurant. Roland Pugh of Cashiers Investment Land LLC has asked for 40,320 gallons per day for 31 acres near Ingles on U.S. 64.
Should Tuckaseigee Water and Sewer Authority board members agree, about 64,000 of the plant’s 100,000 gallon-per-day expansion would be allocated. Petitions from both developers were tabled at a TWSA work session April 12.
“There’s not much allocation up there. There is only going to be so much business that can be accommodated in Cashiers,” said TWSA director Joe Cline.
Built in 1986, the Cashiers plant runs at near-capacity during peak tourist season.
While the plant is currently permitted to process 100,000 gallons per day, a three-phase expansion plan will bring treatment facilities up to 200,000 gpd. That expansion is currently in its second phase, with board members voting April 19 to hire Mattern & Craig engineering firm for its design.
Use of that extra 100,000 gpd would be available to both developers once the second phase is complete.
Blue Ridge Estates is planning to build a hotel, pool and fitness center, 125-seat restaurant and 12 three-bedroom cottages. Cashiers Investment would construct 112 three-bedroom homes.
Granting both requests would leave approximately 34,000 gpd for other Cashiers residents, and TWSA board members April 12 wondered if that will be enough.
“We are selling something that we really don’t have in the present,” Cline said. “I think we need to be careful in the future about doing things like this.”
When the expansion was first discussed, said board member Jim Cochran, TWSA leaders discussed using the added wastewater flow to aid those with deteriorating systems.
“Here we are selling capacity before we’re online,” Cochran said. “Are we reserving an amount for those with failing systems? We could sell all our capacity before the plant’s completed.”
While TWSA leaders never created an official priority list for new sewer hook-ups, Cline said that helping those who needed it first had been “a feeling of the board” when new allocations were first discussed.
Calls from such residents have not materialized, he said.
“If it was me (with a failing system), I’d be calling every day,” he said.
Funds generated from the impact, acreage and capacity-assurance charges developers must pay are what will fund the plant’s expansion, Cline said.
“We would never be able to do this without these (developers) stepping forward,” he said.
|
