At a busy Waitsfield Select Board meeting this week, the board approved a request for proposals for an architectural engineering study for a new town garage, set the municipal tax rate and approved a loan application to fund the first third of the engineering design for a municipal wastewater system.
At the June 26, 2023, meeting the board approved town treasurer Randy Brittingham’s recommendation to set the municipal tax rate at $0.5794, up from last year’s $0.5323 or an increase of 8.9%.
The board finalized a request for proposals (RFP) for an architectural engineering design of a new town garage. The town had $30,00 budgeted toward that design, and at the recommendation of Brittingham, allocated another $15,000 from the town’s 2023 budget surplus toward the project.
“This project has been a long time coming,” said town administrator Annie Decker-Dell’Isola who explained that the RFP was drafted using similar RFPs from other communities. She said that after board approval the RFP would be posted with an eye to a 2024 bond vote.
SAME SITE
Per the RFP, the new town garage will be an 8,500 square foot, six-bay structure at the same site on Tremblay Road. A steel building design is preferred along with a 14 feet by 14 feet insulated overhead door and one bay equipped to wash large vehicles. The RFP calls for radiant floor heat, a standing seam metal roof, several offices, meeting space and restroom facilities. It is anticipated that the garage could be connected to the town’s municipal wastewater system, but not the pending wastewater system, so a new septic system will be needed. Part of the RFP design will be a recommended time table and cost of the building, site work, septic system, and demolition of the existing garage. Board members expect the project will cost at least $1 million. Fayston explored a new town garage and established a committee to lead the process in 2019. At the time, that town was anticipating at least $1 million to construct a new garage.
At that same meeting, the board approved a loan application to the Clean Water State Revolving Fund to cover the next phase in developing a municipal wastewater system to serve Irasville and Waitsfield Village. The Clean Water State Revolving Fund provides forgivable loans for qualified projects, including wastewater systems. To date the town has funded its wastewater feasibility study ($78,753) through that fund and the preliminary engineering report ($120,664) and is now seeking $197,595 to design the first third of the wastewater design. The town will be eligible to seek additional funding through this fund for at least the second third of the design and possibly the third.
ESTIMATE COSTS
Estimated costs for this system are $15,657,700. Senator Bernie Sanders has recommended that $10.4 million in congressional direct spending be allocated for the project and the town was invited to apply for an additional $3 million from the Northern Borders Regional Commission Catalyst program and has applied.
Plans call for creating a decentralized wastewater treatment system with tertiary treatment at the town-owned Munn field where 84,000 gallons a day of wastewater can be accommodated. That capacity is enough to cover priority properties in the service area as well as 70 new units of infill development in the service area plus enough capacity for 8% growth in existing and new commercial flows. Priority properties in the service area are those that are older than 40 years, those that are in the flood plain or river corridor and those whose wastewater systems encroach on well shields. Some properties meet more than one of those criteria. A second priority identified the preliminary engineering report was the voluntary connection of all properties in the service area to the town water system at a cost of $1,071,000.
