City of Whiteville recently issued the following announcement.
Whiteville City Council Tuesday night unanimously approved a budget amendment to make $335,000 in emergency repairs to a lift station, made appointments to the city’s parks and recreation advisory committee, approved the adoption of a city park and handled routine housekeeping matters.
The emergency budget amendment passed unanimously after Public Works Director Travis Faulk told council that it had been discovered earlier in the day that a 32-inch sewer main leading into main treatment plant had collapsed. Out of necessity, repair work to lift station #1 that is expected to require one to two weeks to complete, was already underway when council met.
“If we didn’t do something pretty quick, we were going to be looking at having to replace several $100,000 pumps at the treatment plant,” Faulk told council.
Councilman Robert Leder moved to make the emergency appropriation after Faulk said that his professional opinion was that the city had no choice but to immediately effect the repairs.
The repairs will be paid from the sewer fund’s rainy day savings, or fund balance, of $2.2 million. Even with other non-emergency budget amendments passed Tuesday night, the sewer fund balance will still be healthy at $1.7 million, City Finance Director Colburn Brown said.
Council also unanimously approved three other non-emergency budget amendments reflecting FEMA and state proceeds of $106,000 for hurricane-related emergency response costs and road repairs associated with storms, $196,892 in FEMA proceeds from Hurricane Matthew for acquisition and demolition as well as professional and project management costs for residential buyouts and $96,400 out of sewer fund balance for the city’s share of the costs of a new $490,522 lift station, the bulk of which was paid for by the N.C. Dept. of Transportation.
In other business, council unanimously approved staff recommendation to re-appoint Eric Hill, Mat McLean and Nikki Walker to two-year terms on the parks and recreation committee and to appoint Evan Wright to a one-year term on the same board. Council also unanimously agreed for Atlantic Blue Coast Realty to adopt recreation center fields for two years. Atlantic Blue Coast will conduct at least four maintenance sessions a year and one annual event to celebrate parks and recreation month.
Council also agreed to enter a $404,596 cooperative agreement with the N.C. Office of Resiliency and Recovery for the use of federal funds to buy out 29 vacant flood-damaged properties on West Walter and West Main Streets and M.L. King Boulevard.
Under terms dictated by FEMA, originator of the funds, nothing can ever be built on the properties. The buyouts will remove about $6,000 annually from the city property tax base and about $9,000 a year from the county property tax base.
In another storm-related item, Council agreed for Brown to serve as primary agent and City Manager Darren Currie to serve as secondary agent for the city in connection with applications for reimbursement of costs related to Hurricane Dorian.
In a routine housekeeping matter, council agreed to add Mayor Pro Tem Justin Smith to the list of individuals authorized to sign city documents with BB&T. The change authorization is required whenever there is a change of membership of the council and Kevin Williamson was sworn in last month to replace Sara Thompson on the board.
Original source: https://whitevillenc.gov/news/2020/1/28/city-council-okays-335000-for-emergency-sewer-repairs-finally-gets-matthew-money
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