PITTSBORO — The town’s board of commissioners discussed two of Pittsboro’s major issues on Monday, both with respect to the town’s water: capacity and contamination.
In a November meeting, the board spent most of its time on a public hearing to evaluate suggested improvements to Pittsboro’s wastewater treatment system from Raleigh’s The Wooten Company, whom the board had commissioned to compile an engineering report and environmental information document.
In following weeks, however, Town Manager Chris Kennedy discovered the hearing had been improperly noticed.
“I don’t think it was any fault of the town’s,” he said in a later meeting, “but, nonetheless, we don’t feel like we had the proper two weeks’ notice.”
On Monday, then, the commissioners entertained what amounted to a repeat of November’s debriefing with Carl Scharfe, P.E., a project manager and process engineer representing the Wooten Company. He again presented the company’s findings and recommendations.
The anticipated project will be part of Pittsboro’s larger effort to expand infrastructure in anticipation of the town’s swelling population as Chatham Park and other builders pursue aggressive development across town.
Pittsboro is expected to expand many times over in coming decades from its current population of roughly 5,000 residents. It is not unrealistic, officials say, to expect figures just shy of 50,000 within the next 20 years.
To accommodate such growth, the town must build up its wastewater flow capacity to almost 5 million gallons per day (mgd). As it stands, Pittsboro’s wastewater treatment plant handles .75 mgd with minimal room for expansion.
According to Scharfe, were the town to decline any wastewater flow expansion efforts, Pittsboro would exceed its flow capacity in 2030 when discharge is likely to reach 3.22 mgd. Chatham Park alone is anticipated to eventually produce .499 mgd.
The Wooten Company recommended a two-phase plan to address the capacity shortfall and diffuse what could be a prohibitive cost of expansion.
In phase one, Pittsboro would construct a new pump station at the existing Pittsboro water treatment plant and modify its equalization tank. This relatively conservative renovation would quickly boost the town’s capacity by 2 mgd.
Phase two would involve construction of a second wastewater treatment plant with a 1.91 mgd.
Phase one alone is estimated to cost $19.7 million. That figure is variable, however, pending constructor bids.
The town is eligible for a loan administered by the N.C. Dept. of Water Infrastructure having been issued and “intent to fund” letter back in 2016. The loan would come with a 1.84% interest rate and a 2% origination fee to be paid by the town. The town is not obligated to the accept the loan until after the bidding process begins.
Some of the expense will be fronted by Chatham Park, as the major contributor to wastewater flow expansion needs. The development has agreed to pay 62.5% of the loan cost — up to $13.5 million.
Following construction — one or two years after the loan agreement would begin — Pittsboro would owe its first payment. Considering Chatham Park’s contribution, The Wooten Company estimated that Pittsboro would owe about $686,000 annually — the equivalent of 1,400 new customers.
“So what are the next steps?” Scharfe asked. “The next steps are to receive comments from this public meeting … We’ll take the comments from the previous public meeting, the town will put those minutes and get them to me, and then we’ll add a summary of that information as an appendix to the ER/EID.”
The Department of Water Infrastructure will then use that information to formally launch the project’s start.
One Pittsboro resident attended the public hearing to express her opinion on the proposed course of action.
“I am very pleased to see this project finally moving forward,” she said. “It seemed like it was going to take many, many years for anything like this to happen … I think it is way past time to roll this out. I certainly hope you will move forward.”
Previous meetings of the board of commissioners have frequently touched on Pittsboro’s years-long water contamination issues. PFAS — perfluoroalkyl substances, a family of chemicals known as potential carcinogens — were first discovered in the drinking water as early as 2018. Since then, town leaders have deliberated over how best to address the problem.
Earlier in the year, the board commissioned a task force of local experts to evaluate the town’s PFAS contamination and propose remedies. The report was submitted some months ago, but the board entertained a debriefing from task force representatives for the first time on Monday.
A long-term solution to the water contamination problem, the task force said, is for Pittsboro to continue ongoing development of a regional water treatment plant designed to service a four-partner coalition called the Western Intake Partners. The plant, however — if it is built at all — won’t be operational until 2031.
More realistic, short-term solutions, then, include reverse osmosis filtration systems to be installed across the county at public locations and in private homes. RO systems are too expensive for many individual families to afford, but the town could assume the brunt of those expenses.
Of course, Pittsboro is not to blame for its PFAS issues, and should not have to bear the responsibility of funding countermeasures, according to the task force.
All the contaminants “come from industry upstream,” said Katie Bryant, the task force’s chairperson. “They’re used in manufacturing, and they end up in our waterway.”
Exactly which factories are responsible for the pollution is yet to be determined, but the responsible towns are well known, according to Bryant: Reidsville, Greensboro and Burlington.
“The town of Pittsboro shouldn’t be paying for all this,” she said. “… Those towns are getting rich off of industry up there, they’re benefiting. And the ones losing here are us.”
The commissioners did not immediately discuss plans to pursue mediatory action, but expressed support for the task force’s conclusions and suggestions. Commissioners debated the appropriate next step before settling on a motion to empower Kennedy and his staff with the authority to investigate the town’s options and submit a proposal to the board.
Reporter D. Lars Dolder can be reached at dldolder@chathamnr.com and on Twitter @dldolder.