10 M gal. of water per day headed for Winnsboro

WINNSBORO – “I think we’re finally there! It’s taken quite a while,” Georgianna Graham, Vice President of HPG Engineering Consultants, announced at the Town Council meeting Monday evening.

She was referring to the construction of a water line that will bring an abundant supply of water to Winnsboro from the Broad River – a supply that will also serve to sustain Blythewood customers.

Winnsboro Town Manager Don Wood told The Voice after the Council meeting that the new lines are permitted to bring up to 10 million gallons of water a day to the County.

“We won’t use it all, though. The purpose is to bring that water in to help keep our reservoirs full so we can serve our customers,” Wood said

“This is great for us,” Blythewood Mayor J. Michael Ross told The Voice earlier this week. “From an economic development standpoint, this is what we were looking for. We need to know that we will have a good water supply for everyone who wants to come here.”

Ross said he also hopes to have a better seat at the table when it comes time to renegotiate the next water contract with the Town of Winnsboro.

“I think we would like to have more input this time. But we are really happy about the construction beginning. I know they had to jump through a lot of hoops to get that line approved.”

Final approvals for construction came in April and Graham told Council they have 90 days from approval to advertise for bids

“So we’re ready to advertise for bids in a couple of weeks,” Graham said. She said the Town could reasonably expect to have bids in by the end of July.

Construction on the $15 million project is expected to be completed about this time next year, Graham said.

“The project should have been approved sooner, but there were several unforeseeable delays. You had everything approved last July,” she said, then the Department of Archives and History required an archeological survey, and then the state changed the application form. Then for whatever reason, the permits were not issued until April,” Graham said.

The Town’s attorney, Creighton Coleman reported to Council that the issue of easements had been resolved and that a judge would be signing off on the last of them this week.

Asked about a ground breaking, Mayor Roger Gaddy said he expected to have one after the construction contract is signed.

“We will include both the old and new Council members as well as the construction personnel,” Gaddy said.

Comments

  1. patrick whiddon says

    Will we then get Winnsboro water back and stop paying both Winnsboro and the overpriced City of Columbia water?

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