City hopes to fix sewerage system in ’10

• By RICHARD BURGESS
• Advocate Acadiana bureau
• Published: Oct 30, 2009 - Page: 1BA

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A sewerage treatment system that would use wetlands to filter St. Martinville’s sewage is expected to be operating by the end of next year as part of an agreement to end a Clean Water Act suit against the city.

The Justice Department and city officials have agreed to a settlement of the 9-year-old suit calling for St. Martinville to pay a $50,000 fine and build the new treatment system, according to court documents filed this month.

St. Martinville Mayor Thomas Nelson said Thursday the city expects to begin accepting construction bids for the project late this year or early next year.

Construction will likely take about six months, and Nelson said he sees no problems with completing the project by the end of 2010 — the deadline set in the settlement agreement.

Nelson said the city is waiting for a federal judge to formally OK the agreement before moving forward.

“We were hoping we could bid it tomorrow and be finished with this,” he said.

The city has gone back and forth with federal and state environmental officials since the 1990s over its treatment plant, which does not have the capacity to property treat the city’s wastewater and allows too much pollution to flow into area waterways.

The agreement between the city and the Justice Department settles a lawsuit filed by U.S. Environmental Protection Agency in 2000.

The treatment system the city has agreed to build will pipe wastewater from the city’s conventional sewerage plant into nearby wetlands, where vegetation will filter the water by feeding on the nutrients.

Similar systems are used in a handful of other cities across the state, including Breaux Bridge.

Nelson said St. Martinville has $1.5 million set aside for the project — $900,000 in state money and $600,000 from a federal grant.

The mayor expects construction bids to meet the budget because many contractors are hungry for work at this time.

“We have about 15 people waiting in line to bid,” he said.