The Whitney City Council heard a report about a proposed new wastewater treatment plant and proposed a tax rate for the coming year in a meeting held Thursday, August 15.
In February 2023, the council approved a proposal for engineering and surveying services related to the city’s wastewater treatment plant from Clark Associates.
At that meeting, Public Works Director Billy Pribble, who is now the city’s director of operations, provided background information on the issues with the plant, which has had Texas Commission on Environmental Quality (TCEQ) compliance issues for years and had been under TCEQ enforcement since 2012. The issues stemmed from the total suspended solids in the water leaving the sewer plant being too high to meet required codes. The plant also has an issue with erosion that needs to be addressed.
Reviewing documents from before his time with the city, which began in September 2019, Pribble said that the city requested a 24-month extension on a TCEQ enforcement in 2016 and said that replacing the rock reed filters with a mechanical filtration system had been suggested at that time.
The resolution passed by the council last year detailed the timeline, stating that former City Administrator Chris Bentley did not provide a response to a letter the TCEQ sent to the city in November 2018, but he submitted a response in April 2019 laying out a schedule for replacing the sewer plant with a new activated sludge or extended aeration plant. Pribble said that the deadlines in that timeline were not met.
Over the years, the city has attempted some fixes, including treating the ponds for algae, using an engineered filtration system and contracting for electrofishing, but they were not successful. Pribble said that a chlorine contact chamber that went online for E. coli reduction in March 2021 was highly effective in that effort, and the installation of aerators did result in a reduction of algae and total suspended solids.
The plant has long been an issue that the city has allocated money and resources to try and fix, but information presented at the meeting indicated that the style of the plant was outdated and not appropriate for the area even when it was installed in 1992.
At Thursday’s meeting, Clark Associates representatives proposed a pre-fabricated plant that would be constructed off site and delivered. Some onsite prep work would have to be done, but the system would basically be up and running once electricity was hooked up.
By going with a plant constructed off site, the cost would be reduced from about $4 million to about $2.5 million, the engineering firm said.
Pribble pointed out that the plan still gives the city the opportunity to expand in the future if needed by adding additional modules to the design.
He said that the next step is to explore options for financing the project, and any proposed action will come back before the council.
The council also voted to propose a tax rate of $0.6505 per $100 valuation for the coming year. The rate is higher than both the no-new-revenue rate, which would raise the same tax revenue as last year based on the same properties being taxed, and the voter approval rate, which normally requires voter approval. Last year’s approved rate was $0.6004 per $100 valuation.
Pribble said that while the proposed rate is above the voter approval rate, it is well below the De minimis rate, so it does not trigger an automatic election unless registered voters petition for one. The De minimis rate is a third calculation for a taxing unit with a population of 30,000 or less that is not a school district, water district or special taxing unit.
A public hearing on the rate was scheduled during the council’s next meeting set for Thursday, September 19, at 6 p.m. in the Lake Whitney Public Library meeting room.
The council discussed amendments to the city’s wrecker ordinance, which outlines rules and regulations for wrecker companies called to accident scenes by police officers in the city.
The ordinance cleans up outdated language, establishes a wrecker rotation, requires that companies have insurance and certain minimum equipment, and specifies that all wreckage must be removed from the scene of an accident. It also prohibits companies from showing up to a scene to solicit business without being called.
The council previously approved the updates in 2022, but the changes were never implemented in the ordinance. Council member Jason Ince said that it bothered him that the changes weren’t made when the council first approved them. Pribble said that the issue happened before his time as operations director, and the city had a different mayor and city administrator at that time. Pribble has been going back through actions that the council took in the past that were never followed up on and presenting them to the council to address the issues.
Pribble said that he was presenting the changes to the council again to make sure current members were in approval before putting the language in the ordinance, and the council expressed its desire to proceed with the update.
The council approved placing liens on properties at 803 North Brazos and 416 East Jefferson after the owners failed to respond to requests to clean up the properties. The city cleaned the properties and the owners will be financially responsible for the costs of cleanup. Code enforcement reported that this is only allowed on properties that are not homesteads; on a homesteaded property, the city can only issue citations.
The council voted to advertise and accept sealed bids for properties at 101 North San Jacinto Street and 501 East Polk Avenue. Pribble said that the action is part of the city’s efforts to look into unused property that it owns that needs to be sold.
Council members declared a 2015 Polaris, a water pump and a green dump trailer as surplus property to be sold. Public Works Supervisor Chris Brennan said that the department is cleaning up its yard and getting rid of unused property.
A special events application submitted by the Lake Whitney Chamber of Commerce for the 15th annual downtown Grinch Fest and Christmas parade on December 14 was approved, along with the proposed parade route.
In departmental reports for July, department heads told the council that the police department responded to 192 incidents, EMS responded to 40 calls with an average response time of 5 minutes and 39 seconds, public works repaired five water leaks and installed one new water and sewer tap, and the fire department responded to 57 calls in the city and 17 in the county.
Animal Control Officer Drew Youngblood told the council that the city is receiving positive feedback on its animal control program, with local rescue volunteers reporting a decrease in stray animals in Whitney. He said that he has already had success in returning animals to their owners thanks to the registration system.
Donations are being accepted to help the city create a holding facility for animals and assist with other needs. (See accompanying story in this edition about the fundraising efforts.)
In open forum, Stephania Shelby spoke to the council about the need for a temporary shelter for animals. She is currently fostering animals and volunteering to help with the city’s program, and she said that more help is desperately needed for the 16 animals currently in the city’s care. She said that her husband and others have volunteered to do any necessary work on a building to create a temporary shelter, but they need to locate a building.
Liz Schneider also spoke to the council on behalf of Lions Club District 2-X3 and said that Whitney’s club has been identified as a club that should be revived with new members. She invited council members to support the effort, seek out new members and provide input about beneficial projects that the Lions could support in the community. An informational meeting for prospective members has been scheduled for Tuesday, September 10, at 6 p.m. at the Lake Whitney Public Library.
The council’s next regularly scheduled monthly meeting will be Thursday, September 19, at 6 p.m.
