Governor suggests possibilities of receivership or tying in with Walnut Bayou system
Tallulah’s water system might go under a joint receivership where the state sends someone to take over the operations or it could be tied in with the Walnut Bayou Water Association.
Those were just some of the options presented when Tallulah officials met with Gov. Jeff Landry in Baton Rouge on April 30 about issues at its water plant. The goal is for officials to present a more concrete path at Thursday’s city council meeting.
Rehabbing the water plant with the city overseeing the project is still an option, but unexpected costs have kept that from happening.
Womack and Sons Construction Group, LLC, based in Harrisonburg, was the only company to submit bids to rehab the water plant. The bid was for $18,388,340 the first time and $19,895,729 the second time.
However, the city only has $15 million set aside for the water plant rehab. A total of $7.8 million came from the United States Department of Agriculture. A total of $4 million would come from loans and the other $3.8 million would be through a grant. Another $5 million would come from the Water Sector Development Program. The rest of the money would come from American Rescue Plan Act funds.
“$15 million, we definitely thought would be enough to take care of the rehab issues,” City Spokesperson Yvonne Lewis said.
Lewis said rehabbing the water plant would cost Tallulah close to $22 million. The first $19,895,729 would come from the bid, while another $3 million would go toward engineering and non-construction fees.
“Once we had the second bid, we started looking at some different options of OK what can we do here?” she said. “Because the total project cost is $22 million. We only have $15 (million). We have to come up with $7 million.”
After Womack and Sons Construction Group’s second bid came in, Lewis said Tallulah officials went to the Water Sector Development Program seeking more funding. She said the program only agreed to provide a small amount of additional funding.
Lewis said another meeting with the USDA took place. She said the USDA did agree to provide $4 million, but the majority of it would be in the form of a loan. If a loan was provided where the city had to pay back the money, she said that could mean another increase in the citizens’ water rates.
“The Mayor (Charles Finlayson) was really hesitant to do that,” Lewis said. “He didn’t want to put a big burden on the citizens.”
State Sen. Katrina Jackson notified Tallulah officials that Landry would like to speak with them. Lewis, Finlayson, City Clerk Gerald Odom, District 1 Council Member Joe Scott, District 2 Council Member Lisa Houston and District 5 Council Member Toriano Wells all attended the meeting with Landry on April 30.
“Basically, what the Governor offered was to allow Tallulah to go under what’s called a joint receivership,” Lewis said. “So what that means is that an individual would be selected by the state and they would come in and basically take over the water operations and help us put together an analysis to see how we could move forward.”
Lewis said Landry talked about Tallulah tying in its service with the Walnut Bayou Water Association.
“The Governor’s reasoning was he wanted to step in to see if he could offer us some assistance since it just seemed like the project kept increasing in cost,” Lewis said.
Lewis explained how it would work if Tallulah’s water service was tied in with the Walnut Bayou Water Association.
“We would purchase bulk water from Walnut Bayou,” she said. “Then, we would in turn pay them whatever the water bill was. Then we would still use our distribution system to get the water to our citizens.”
Lewis said purchasing water from Walnut Bayou could be a temporary or permanent solution. She added a concern about purchasing bulk water is the city already has an existing debt. She said the debt is $6 million from bonds years ago that the city received to deal with water issues. She noted Tallulah is paying $700,000 annually until the bonds are paid for.
Tallulah is also exploring other possible options to fix the city’s water issues.
Lewis said Finlayson and Odom are looking at the numbers to see what Tallulah could afford.
“The mayor has indicated that all of us would like to keep our own water,” Lewis said.
Lewis said the city has been under an administrative order from the state to fix issues at the water plant since 2019, but now, things are at a point where something has to be done. She also said issues other than inflation have caused the cost of potentially rehabbing the plant to increase. One example she noted was the Bill America Buy America Act, which means “The domestic content procurement preference requires that all iron, steel, manufactured products, and construction materials used in covered infrastructure projects are produced in the United States.”
Lewis appreciated being able to meet with Landry.
“What we say for the Governor coming to the table with that was thank goodness for a Governor that’s in Baton Rouge and worrying about the people up in Tallulah, La.,” Lewis said.
If the city rehabs its water plant, the issues could be fixed in 2025.
“The rehab is about a year and a half,” Finlayson said. “We don’t know when Walnut Bayou would tie in.”
If the city was able to accept a bid, the rehab would start 60 to 90 days later.
“I just don’t know how much more time it has in it,” said Lewis of the water plant.
“That’s the problem,” said Finlayson in agreement,
Lewis cited the city’s most recent boil advisory order as an example. A transformer went out on one of the poles and knocked out power to the plant.
Odom said he sent financial information to the Louisiana Legislative Auditor’s office.
“Everything is so shaky,” he said.
“I’m going to let him know that we need to do something immediately and it’s an emergency.
“We’ve got to act very quickly. We just can’t let it keep lingering.”
Odom said the Legislative Auditors would recommend to the Louisiana Department of Health on whether the Tallulah water plant should be under a receivership.
Lewis said Tallulah needs $7 million immediately to be able to rehab the water plant without any other issues.
“The only thing that would save us that would not require more time is if somebody just miraculously came to Tallulah and said here’s $7 million,” she said. “Get it going.
“We would like to go that route, but if something else presented itself that made more sense, these two (Finlayson and Odom), they’re always going to be fiscally responsible. They’re always going to do anything that might help out.”
Lewis acknowledged that, one way or another, Tallulah needs clean water.
“I think Gerald (Odom) has said it for all of us,” she said. “Without water, we die. This town goes down. “That’s one of the things that made us want to do this rehab project in the first place. We could not go out and court any business because we did not have reliable water.
“People are hurting right now. Our businesses are hurting.”
Lewis also mentioned how the Madison Parish School District was not in session for some of the days last week because of water issues. The district was in the middle of testing last week.
“It doesn’t just affect us,” she said. “It affects everything in our community. Water is paramount for everybody.”
Lewis said the State of Louisiana may listen to a plan the City of Tallulah has to fix issues at the water plant, but would have to be something pretty good. State officials might be the ones to decide the next step to fix Tallulah’s water issues.
“We’re in a position where the state could not give us a choice,” she said. “They could say this is what you’re going to do and that’s how it’s going to be. I think that’s probably one of the reasons the Legislative Auditor is looking at it to see.”
