ROCKINGHAM — Tuesday, the leaders of the city took a grant worth several million dollars so that improvements to the wastewater treatment plant could be made.
The $12,805,000 comes from the 2023 Appropriations Act and is a Direct Projects grant that will help local governments with building needs. It will be managed by the Drinking Water Reserve and the Wastewater Reserve.
This is the first big improvement to the plant since 1990. It will make handling sludge more efficient, provide backup power, and help the plant serve the whole area, City Manager Monty Crump said when the funding was announced last year.
For more than ten years, Ellerbe has sent its wastewater to Rockingham. Soon, the county will also send wastewater from the Energy Way Industrial Complex south of Hamlet.
The council passed a resolution that lets Crump give information about the project to state organizations and sign the necessary paperwork for the Division of Water Infrastructure.
The city council also approved a budget for a capital project fund that was linked to the first one:
- $9,083,853 for construction and contracted services
- $1,737,889 for professional services, fees, and the engineer
- $18,000 for miscellaneous administrative fees
- $1,965,258 for contingency
As for the engineer, Crump said that many things for the job are already set up.
The project is supposed to be done by late 2026 or early 2027.
The council set a public hearing for the new city code for the next meeting on Oct. 8, which was before the water treatment plant business.
John Massey, Assistant City Manager, says that the city hired American Legal Publishing in October 2023 to recodify. This includes all changes made since the last recodification in 2002.
The project also makes sure that the city’s code is in line with state laws, updates references to laws, and includes staff changes, such as getting rid of old language and references to local boards that don’t exist anymore.
Massey said that the city will hire the company every year to make sure that all local changes are written down and that the city stays in line with state law. Massey said that would “avoid the hard work and time-consuming task of catching up on over 20 years of updates all at once.”
American Legal Publishing will also host the city’s code on its website so it can be quickly changed as part of the deal.
At City Hall, you can get copies of the new code.
Holleigh McLaurin was also chosen by the city council to serve on the Historic Preservation Board. McLaurin will take Michelle Denham’s spot, which was left open.
It was decided in June that Marty Goodman and Randy Warren would stay on that board.
Massey said that the board can work with five people, even though there are still two open spots. Massey said in July that the UDO asks for a seven-member board, but that it has only had five members because it is hard to find qualified people to join.