The Town of Silt Board of Trustees, along with professional staff and engineers have spent since mid-2020 working to find the best path forward to provide Silt citizens with the pre-treatment option that it should have had since the beginning.
In 2022, Dewberry engineers conducted a technical study of the Silt W/WW plants and produced master plans to be used specifically to develop short and long-term plans and costs for implementing improvements. This work was critical in order to complete the “Project Needs Assessment” (PNA) for the State of Colorado by their June 30, 2022 deadline. The PNA is required in order to be eligible for low interest loans and grants offered by the Federal government through the State. The current loan deadline for the Drinking Water Revolving Fund is June 15, 2023. The next opportunity to apply for the loan will be in January 2024.
Town Staff has been working with consultants and State of Colorado staff to document the need for the project, how to accomplish it and how to pay for it. Personnel have spent the entire time evaluating and re-evaluating strategies, costs, funding sources, rate structures, etc. in order to prepare a loan application package this year.
Our contract with Garney, our construction manager at risk (CMAR), requires them to give us a value for the work based on a 60% design completion of construction documents on June 9. Garney will be present to report to the Board on June 12 on their progress toward determining a cost for the project. Jim Mann will provide some detail on the average cost per Silt ratepayer, the total cost and the latest on the financing package.
After careful review of the information available at this time, staff and consultants recommend that the Board direct staff to apply for a Drinking Water Revolving Fund loan through the State of Colorado on June 15, 2023 to cover the costs of the Silt Water Treatment Plant project.
The Board of Trustees will hold a work session Monday, June 12 beginning at 6:00 p.m. with the regular Board meeting to follow at 7:00 p.m. The event can be attended in person, viewed on Channel 10 if you have cable, livestreamed on our website at: www.townofsilt.org or by signing into the Zoom link which will be posted on the town's homepage.
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