County to consider Williams Acres
sewer service

Copyright © 2008
Gallup Independent
By Bill Donovan
Staff writer

GALLUP — The McKinley County Commission will be considering a new ordnance at its Thursday meeting that would require all residents in Williams Acres who live within 300 feet of the sewer line that will be built, to tie into it once it is up and operating.

Thursday will be the first reading of the ordnance to give residents of the area an opportunity to give their opinions before it is formally considered, probably at the next commission meeting.

The ordnance is the only major item on Thursday’s agenda; the meeting is being held two days later than usual to accommodate one of the commissioners, Billy Moore, who was unable to make Tuesday’s meeting.

The 135 or so families who live in Williams Acres, which is located just 3 miles west of Gallup, have been trying to get the funding for the $1.5 million project for several years and thanks to several legislative grants and $500,000 from the Community Development Block Grant Program this year, residents have managed t raise more than $1.2 million and the project is expected to be under construction in the next few months.

Lance Allgood, director of the city’s utility program, said Thursday that the plans to tie into the city wastewater treatment plant still must get formal City Council approval. That may occur at the next meeting of the council.

That’s not expected to be a problem since several months ago, the county agreed to give the city $250,000 from the county’s fire gross receipts tax to help build the new fire station on the west side of town. One of the things commissioners mentioned was that in exchange, the city should assist residents of Williams Acres.

County Manager Tom Trujillo said the new ordinance will follow laws within the city of Gallup, which require city residents to tie into the city sewer line if they live within 300 feet of it.

The cost of the tie-in, which is expected to go from several hundred to several thousand depending on how close they are to the sewer line and the terrain, will have to be paid for by the individual families but Williams Acre residents who have attended previous meetings on the issue have said they were willing to pay the price to get away from sewer lagoons.

Allgood said residents of the subdivision would be required to set up their own water and sanitation district which would bill the residents for their water and sewer use each month. “We would provide the water but they would have to do the billing,” said Allgood, adding that this is the same setup that Gallup uses for similar subdivisions, such as Gamerco and Rehoboth.

The work session is set to begin at 6 p.m. in the county commission chambers on the third floor of the county courthouse.

Wednesday
October 22, 2008
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