Water treatment plant receives state
approval
By Bob Robinson
STAR STAFF
Elizabethton Mayor Sam LaPorte said last night
that the City of Elizabethton would begin the bidding process
to improve water quality standards at the Big Springs water
treatment plant.
City Manager Charles Stahl said the Tennessee
Department of Environment and conservation gave him a verbal
okay to proceed with the project.
Heavy rainfall in August caused turbidity problems
at the Big Springs plant, a problem which has existed for
10 years, according to Gay Irwin, program manager of the Division
of Water Supply for TDEC.
The turbidity forced the City in August to issue
a two-week water advisory, urging citizens not to drink the
water without boiling it first.
Irwin said the City has already been given $2
million for various improvements through the Drinking Water
Revolving Fund; $800,000 of that money has been earmarked
for the Big Springs project.
"Since approval of the project and receipt of
the available funds, the City of Elizabethton has inquired
if the monies designated for these projects might better be
used for the development of a new source intake on the Watauga
River," Irwin wrote in a Sept. 13 letter to Ted Leger, public
works director for the City of Elizabethton.
