Minutes 01/26/1971 - Laserfiche WebLink

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PU TUESDAY JANUARY 26, 1971 At its meeting on November 20, 1968, The Board directed that a special order be issued to the Villa Heights Water Company~' Inc. to abate pollution of State waters in accordance with a schedule set forth in the order. In October 1969, the Henry. County Public Service Authority acquired the facilities of the Villa Heights Water Company, Inc. with the intention of conveying wastes from the Villa Heights Subdivision into the City of Martinsville for ultimate treatment and disposal. An interceptor line leading into the City of Martinsville is in close proximity to the Villa Heights Subdivision. As we understand it, there was apparently agreement between the Public Service Authority and the City on conveying wastes into the City and this agreement was subject to the details of a contract to be drawn later. When the contract was drawn for signing by the County, provlslons in the contract (which would normally be found in a zoning code) were such that the County felt that it could not legally sign the contract. A subsequent opinion by the Attorney General's Office substantiated the County's position. However, the City of Martinsville, which had similar contracts with private users in the County, was unwilling to alter the terms of the contract. Since this was the case, in August of 1970, consulting engineers for the Public Service Authority submitted plans for pumping sewage from the Villa Heights area to its existing treatment plant at Co1linsville. The initial reaction to these plans by the State Department of Health and the staff was that they should not be approved, since the Villa Heights Area lies just beyond the Martios~i1le City limits and with . 1" vyhlC d . h an easy access to an lnterceptor lnejCOU convey sewage lnto t e City. By treating wastes in Collinsville the Public Service Authority would be conveying wastes to another watershed and there was concern both with the number of pumping stations involved in such a system and the capability of existing lines to receive the hydraulic load imposed from the Villa Heights Area. After conferring with the Health Department and engineers for the Authority, the staff is of the opinion, and the Health Department agrees, that there seems to be a legal impasse involved in conveying wastes to the City at this time and, while we do not favor conveying wastes to the Collinsville plant for treatment, we believe that fuis method can be approved with population and flow restrictions placed on the sewer lines. However, we feel that both the City and Henry County Public Service Authority have missed an excellent opportunity to exhibit cooperation at the local governmental level and we do not believe particularly in view of new Federal grant rules and regulations that we can recommend that the Public Service Authority be given grant funds for the construction. We also feed that, until such time as the City of Martinsville and the Henry County Public Service Authority develop a plan for treating wastes from the City and areas of the County adjacent to the City on a cooperative regional basis, no grant funds should be made available either to the City of Martinsville or for areas of Henry County adjacent to the City.