The Fentress County Utility District will soon begin work on an estimated $2.2 million ARP project.
Fentress County Utility District General Manager Lynn Delk said the project includes a new long-distance water line and pumping station for the north portion of the utility district’s water system. Delk said that portion of the system has not seen an upgrade since the 1990s.
“It was a project that we had been looking at trying to put into the system for a few years, to just upgrade the north system and to make the quality of the water just be better,” Delk said.
Delk said he expects the project to begin in the next 45-60 days. Delk said residents may experience minor disruptions during the project.
“It’s a new line and it goes cross-county,” Delk said. “Both connections will be tap connections, which you are not turning off the water. The most a customer might be affected during a tap time is 45 minutes to an hour or something of that nature.”
The utility district and the county commission have awarded the $2.2 million bid despite the bid being over budget. Delk said the costs of materials were a main contributor to the project being over budget. Delk said the utility district is having to pay an estimated $600,000 out of its budget to cover the remaining cost.
“It’s a pretty drastic impact on us,” Delk said. “But as I had said, we were putting and sitting aside (funds) and looking at this project coming up over a period of a few years, and so basically just kind of speeding the project up a couple of years.”
Delk said the timeline to complete the project is not known yet.