Tuesday City Council meeting takes up Raw Water Supply, Special Census and BOE Sewer lines

Crossville city council holds their regular February meeting on Tuesday the 13th and will hear the results of the citywide census taken late last year along with making possible decisions on the next move for expanding the raw water supply and taking over the ownership and maintenance of sewer lines to three county elementary schools.

Crossville City Council members L-R J.H. Graham

Danny Wyatt, Mayor James Mayberry, Pamala Harris

and Scot Shanks 

The council's evening starts at 5:15 with the audit committee meeting followed at 5:45 by the beer board meeting with one application for Paparitos Southwest Grill on the agenda. The solicitation board meets at 5:55 PM and the regular meeting agenda starts at 6:00 PM.

The contractor who performed the special city census Arnold Harbolt will be presenting the results of the census count to the council during the meeting. The census may give the city additional funding from the state shared taxes that are distributed to cities on a per capita basis. The city has been successful in gaining additional revenue over the cost of the census for the last 20 years between the regular federal census.

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Council will also determine a direction for the city's push to increase the raw water supply for the plateau. During last weeks work session, the council discussed the results of a study of previous reports and estimates of demand prepared by engineering firm J. R. Wauford.

Wauford's report recommended looking at 4 options including, Raising Meadow Park Lake Dam and continuing to harvest from Lake Tansi, Raising Meadow Park Lake Dam and harvesting from Lake Tansi and Caney Fork River, Raising Meadow Park Lake Dam and harvesting from Lake Tansi and Holiday Lake and Harvesting water from Watts Bar Lake.

The engineering firm recommends the city plan a meeting with representatives of the US Army Corps of Engineers on the next steps toward the water supply expansion.

The council will also consider the request of the Cumberland County Board of Education that the city take over the responsibility for maintenance of sewer lines that serve North, South and Brown Elementary schools. The lines were built to hook the schools up to the city sewer service and all repairs and maintenance has been done by the school system.

At the work session, Councilman J. H. Graham said he was in favor of the action and felt it was something the city could do for the BOE. City manager Greg Wood said the line to South was about 20 years old and if the city planned to add more capacity to the Brown line at least one lift station would be required. In addition the city would map the location of the line once they take it over.

City Council Looks to Again Move Forward with Raw Water Supply Project

During the Crossville city council's February work session, the council heard the results of a study on the area's raw water supply prepared by the engineering firm of J. R. Wauford.

Engineer Greg Davenport presented the findings to the council and after a lengthy discussion, Davenport recommended that the city set up a meeting with the US Army Corps of Engineers to determine the direction of the next steps for the planning necessary to move forward. The city has been looking to raise its Meadow Park Lake Dam for a number of years in order to expand the capacity of Meadow Park Lake as a raw water reservoir.

Engineer Greg Davenport, standing, with the J.R. Wauford 

firm goes over the company's report on raw water supply 

needs for Crossville with members of the city council.

Davenport reported that the area of Crossville and Cumberland County is growing at a fast rate currently about 30 percent over 20 years but had grown even faster than that in previous times. “Sometime in the future, a new raw water source will be needed,” advised Davenport.

Crossville has been talking about raw water supply for the community for at least 20 years and the Wauford report looked at the previous studies on the topic and then looked to forecast water usage out 20 and 50 years into the future and determine the alternatives to supply water as needed.

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One of the question marks in the study is whether or not additional utility districts may buy water from Crossville in the future including Crab Orchard Utility District and the West Cumberland Utility District. Davenport said that Crab Orchard is currently looking at future needs and attempting to add at some water harvesting projects that might be difficult to permit. West Cumberland is currently looking to Crossville as a supplier rather than the current Bondecroft Utility District.

A number of years ago the city looked at the possibility of building a completely new lake but environmental issues lead them in another direction.  There are some potential problems with the Meadow Park Lake project that need further consideration.  The only other main supply option is to build a line and pump raw water up from Watts Bar Lake.  Most plateau residents have expressed opposition to such a plan.

The potential needs of the community include residential, utility districts and an industrial growth allowance as well. Davenport explained that when the city reaches 80 percent of its water production capacity it was required by the state to start planning for future expansion.