Otsego city commissioners voted Monday, July 17, to move ahead with a project years in the making to improve the wastewater treatment plant.
City manager Thad Beard said, “We’ve been working on this for a number of years and it’s finally coming to fruition.”
The city intends to borrow $1.3 million from a state of Michigan-administered low interest loan program for 20 years to make the improvements, which are intended to keep the system running cheaper and more efficiently.
“They were looking for danger to the environment and they said we didn’t meet that,” Beard said. “But also it will improve conditions for our people and we definitely care about that.”
City commissioners approved the lowest bidder to the project, Davis Construction Inc. Beard said there would have to be some post bid changes to get the project down from the low bid of $1.4 million to the budgeted amount of $1.3 million.
Aaron Davenport, an engineer contracted by the city for the project, said the start would likely be in September with completion the following September.
He said that both bidders were very qualified and would have done a good job. Davis had previously done work at the wastewater plant.
Another $300,000 will be spent by the city without borrowing because it was rejected by officials who said it didn’t meet the state fund’s requirements.
Davenport said he didn’t understand how the disinfection/chlorination improvements wouldn’t benefit the environment. He said the city workers had done a great job making the old system keep function properly and that it was a perverse incentive for the city to be rewarded if the system had been let fail.
The improvements to that part of the system will be done at the same time as a contract amendment later, Beard said.
City officials have raised sewer rates for customers to fund these and other improvements.
The planned improvements include:
• Disinfection: Replacement of aging scales used for gaseous chlorine and sulfur dioxide cylinders. Flow based chemical feed instrumentation added for accuracy, replacement of gas detectors, new chlorine and sulfur dioxide piping.
• Sludge Handling Storage and Disposal: Replacement of sludge pumps, heat exchanger and gas compressor/sludge mixer. Sludge store tank decant piping and valves are currently non-functional, leading to issues of sludge storage.
• Ferric Chloride: Replacement of chemical feed pumps, metering equipment and associated piping in the ferric feed room and around the site. Current piping is poorly arranged and partially plugged. Rerouting the piping will enable better employee access and employee safety in filling the tank. This also includes removal and replacement of the alarm station.
Telemetry: Installation of supervisory control and data acquisition. This is a computer system for gathering and analyzing real time data, enabling real-time observation and manipulation though desktop or mobile terminals.
WWTP Lab: Building addition to increase the size of lab, replace current 1989 work surfaces, cabinetry and equipment.
Raw Sewage Pumps: Replacement of existing shaft driven sewage pumps with dry-pit pumps with variable frequency drives. This includes replacement of all piping and valves.
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