NEWBERRY — Newberry City Council assessed the progress of its ongoing city wide projects in a scheduled work session Tuesday.
Council members made trips to assess the City of Newberry Water Plant, West End CDBG Project and City of Newberry Utility Shop.
The City of Newberry Water Plant, which surpassed its targeted project completion date, now has a substantial completion date of June 29, with a final completion date slated for Aug. 28.
Improvements in the process of being completed are filter valves at the main plant, scheduled to be completed April 14, installation of electrical panels MCC – 1 on April 23, start up of MCC- 1 – A, equalizer basin and overflow basin connection and backfilling on May 19, along with a backwash station and delivery of new pump and pump can are scheduled for June 29 along with a high service pump station #1 which will be out of service April 24.
Verification of pipe connecting to the pump is also needed. If the line is concrete, time will need to be extended. Based on pump arrival, there will also be an equalizer pump station contract add on also expected to be completed on June 29. The Clearwell #1 rehabilitation estimated start date is scheduled for Aug. 28 and SCADA upgrades will also be taking place.
The Water Plant will also be making repairs to parts of its dome.
“It doesn’t look like we’ll have to replace the entire top of the dome. We will have to cut out portions of it. So it’ll look like Swiss cheese come September. But hopefully we can get by without having to re-do the entire dome,” said Utilities Director Marc Regier. “We are a little behind, but everyone I’ve talked to has said nothing’s ever on time. The as-built drawing that we had for the plant are not correct. There is piping all through that plant. I guess they started doing it one way and then stopped and changed the way they were going to design it, so we found pipes that go nowhere.”
Regier said that progress is being made everyday and along with rehabilitation that has already been completed, the goal is to bring in additional piping and pump capacity.
“The additional piping is being brought in to be able to have the ability to expand a much shorter border if the need arose. You wouldn’t have to go all the way back to the river and rebuild stuff, you could just add a treatment place on the other side,” said Regier.
The estimated cost for the entire upgrade is $10,250,000.
The West End CDBG Project, the latest city project, took about a year too long to complete based off the timeline originally given.
“Some of the major problems we had in here were paving and finding a good contractor to come in and pave. The budget played a major issue with us. This project was a little more expensive than what we would’ve liked and initially planned, but sometimes when you get into these things that’s just what happens,” said City Manager Matt DeWitt.
“Water and sewer line replacement was the reason for the project. They had exceeded their useful life and were beginning to fail. Since the roads would be severely damaged during the process, the upgrades to roads and curbs were made,” said Assistant Utilities Director Tim Baker. “These upgrades were a by-product of the line replacement. We hope to enter the next phase of line replacement soon, but are still waiting on the scope and estimated cost.”
The City has already completed two out of five phases in the West End Project. Improvements in West End include re-exposing the curb where there was busted granite and street paving. Half a mile of new curb has been completed in West End.
“It’s not just about water and sewer when we come into these neighborhoods. We want to make sure when we leave, the neighborhood feels like it’s been improved more so than just the water and sewer, because they’re not going to see the water and sewer every day. But what they will see is their curbs, streets and their right-of-ways. It looks a whole lot better than it did last year,” said DeWitt. “What we’ve noticed with these projects is that people keep up their yards and they tend to invest in their homes. So when they see investment going on around them, they in turn do the same thing with their own property. Everywhere you see new pavement is part of the new project area.”
Council was also visited the Utility Shop where they were informed on some of the shop’s newest updates, including a new warehouse, electric shop and shed, water/sewer shop sheds that were constructed and a new electric substation was also constructed adjacent to the new facility.
“Residents will benefit from the Water Plant upgrade by continuing to receive high quality and abundant water that exceeds DHEC standards and also allows for system growth,” said Baker. “They benefit from the Utility Center upgrade by our being able to maintain an adequate inventory of materials that allow for daily maintenance of our system. We also keep our equipment in a covered facility that will extend its usable life. The residents of the West End directly see the benefits of the upgrades to their system and it also reduces our overtime and repair costs.”
