White Hall approves line of credit for disposal plant repairs

By Editor | June 21, 2023 |

By Carmen Ensinger

White Hall Council, at the June 13 council meeting, voted to establish a $250,000 line of credit at People’s Bank for repairs scheduled to be done at the water disposal plant.
“We are going to drain the tanks and clean them and in case we find a problem we wanted to have some money so we will be able to fix the problem,” Alderwoman Sue Vinyard said. “Hopefully we won’t need to use it, but we won’t be able to proceed if we don’t have the money to make the repairs. If they don’t find any problems, we won’t need it. The bank has already approved the line of credit for us.”
Apparently, there is a smell and leak of ammonia coming from somewhere in the tanks. To drain the tanks, the city will have to obtain a permit from the EPA to drain the tank. The sludge will be drained out of the tank which will allow them to search for the problem.
The council also approved purchasing a grinder for the disposal plant at a cost of $13,034 with the money coming out of ARPA funds.
The council rescinded a motion it made on Feb. 13 to raise the service charge from $50 to $100 on services that have been disconnected. The fee will go back to $50 with the idea that if you can’t pay your water or gas bill and get disconnected, then you certainly can’t pay the higher reconnect fee.
Last month, the council discussed starting to charge a fee for installing a tap or moving an existing tap for a gas or water customer.
“In the past we have not charged anything to move a person’s tap, whether it was moved three feet or 20 feet,” Vinyard said. “We have talked about this several times trying to come up with a fee because sometimes when they get into it, it ends up being very expensive if they have to go across the street to the sewer.”
In the end, the council decided that a $1,000 tap fee, plus the cost of materials, for both water and gas would be a fair fee.
Also, last month the council asked their engineer, Bryan Cannon with Benton and Associates, to come up with a revised water rate to present to Greene County Rural Water (GCRW).
“The last time the water rates were revised for GCRW was 2018,” Cannon said. “We looked at everything and per the original contract, you could revise the rates every two years. They are actually using about 50 percent of the city’s production of water right now.”
According to Cannon, GCRW isn’t even paying enough to pay for the cost to produce the water it is using.
“Right now, they are paying $4.02 per 1,000 gallons of water and it is costing you $5.25 to produce it,” Cannon said. “So, we are proposing an increase to $5.52 per 1,000. This increase will give the city an extra $62,000 per year. Right now you are losing money.”
The council approved sending a letter to GCRW with the proposed increase in water rates.
City Treasurer Mona McMillen said she had a zoom meeting with People’s Bank regarding the debit card reader the city will be getting that will allow the residents to pay their utility bills with their debit cards.
“The next step is we have to open up an account at the bank for all of this money to go into,” McMillen said. “One thing I am really excited about is that once we get this established, it is equipped to do the online bill pay.”