Water and sewage bills for Northwest Arkansas customers could double over the next two years, unless a trip by several area mayors and their Chamber of Commerce Presidents to Washington D.D. is a success.
New, tighter Environmental Protection Agency standards for Northwest Arkansas mean several waste water treatment facilities are facing upgrades that could cost taxpayers millions of dollars. Fayetteville, Springdale, Tontitown, Rogers, and Bentonville taxpayers will feel the effects, so area mayors are trying to keep water and sewage standards where they are. If the new standards hold, area mayors say Northwest Arkansas will have to pay a total of almost $60 million in upgrades. Springdale Mayor Doug Sprouse reacts with simplicity: "that's a huge cost." But that cost won't fall to the cities, according to Sprouse and other mayors. Sprouse explains: "Springdale just within the last couple of years has just finished our renovation and retro fit of our facilities, and to back up and have to go back over this and meet these new regulations, we're looking at some substantial costs to our citizens. In Fayetteville's situation, they just finished a huge expense to their taxpayers on a waste water treatment plant." Fayetteville Mayor Lioneld Jordan affirms Sprouse's words: "it's difficult for me to take a jackhammer to that new wastewater treatment plant, when we just cut the ribbon on it two years ago." And Jordan says with a tight budget, the city has no room to absorb the costs. "We can be looking for water and sewer rates almost doubling on the residents." Jordan says the new standards could be a result of an Oklahoma lawsuit claiming phosphorus levels are too high, in Arkansas water that's flowing into their state. In response, Mayor Sprouse offers this solution: "what we could do is if we could send our water to another watershed and not even send it to Oklahoma, then their rivers would dry up, and they wouldn't be able to run their ski boats, haa! So I guess that's the other option." The mayors say the goal of their trip is to ask the EPA for more time and less restrictive standards, and try to save Northwest Arkansas taxpayers from those skyrocketing water bills. Officials say nationally, only eight water treatment plants can meet the proposed standards, which would go into effect June of 2012.
New, tighter Environmental Protection Agency standards for Northwest Arkansas mean several waste water treatment facilities are facing upgrades that could cost taxpayers millions of dollars. Fayetteville, Springdale, Tontitown, Rogers, and Bentonville taxpayers will feel the effects, so area mayors are trying to keep water and sewage standards where they are. If the new standards hold, area mayors say Northwest Arkansas will have to pay a total of almost $60 million in upgrades. Springdale Mayor Doug Sprouse reacts with simplicity: "that's a huge cost." But that cost won't fall to the cities, according to Sprouse and other mayors. Sprouse explains: "Springdale just within the last couple of years has just finished our renovation and retro fit of our facilities, and to back up and have to go back over this and meet these new regulations, we're looking at some substantial costs to our citizens. In Fayetteville's situation, they just finished a huge expense to their taxpayers on a waste water treatment plant." Fayetteville Mayor Lioneld Jordan affirms Sprouse's words: "it's difficult for me to take a jackhammer to that new wastewater treatment plant, when we just cut the ribbon on it two years ago." And Jordan says with a tight budget, the city has no room to absorb the costs. "We can be looking for water and sewer rates almost doubling on the residents." Jordan says the new standards could be a result of an Oklahoma lawsuit claiming phosphorus levels are too high, in Arkansas water that's flowing into their state. In response, Mayor Sprouse offers this solution: "what we could do is if we could send our water to another watershed and not even send it to Oklahoma, then their rivers would dry up, and they wouldn't be able to run their ski boats, haa! So I guess that's the other option." The mayors say the goal of their trip is to ask the EPA for more time and less restrictive standards, and try to save Northwest Arkansas taxpayers from those skyrocketing water bills. Officials say nationally, only eight water treatment plants can meet the proposed standards, which would go into effect June of 2012.
