Monroe County Commissioners formally approved by a 3-0 vote on Thursday, June 25 a resolution to issue just over $20.3 million in revenue bonds to provide county water to the Juliette/Rum Creek area.
Included in the $20.3 million bond is $16.3 million to complete the current Juliette water project, which will provide county water to 852 homes surrounding Plant Scherer. The first phase of the contract, which will cost about $4.5 million, includes homes and subdivisions along Hwy. 18, Edge Road, Lee King Road and Jenkins Road. Work will begin next month on a $1.4 million portion of Phase One approved on June 2 along Hwy. 18 and Abare Road. Commissioners first learned in February that some private wells in Juliette/Rum Creek were reported to have high levels of dangerous toxic elements, including hexavalent chromium. All county water delivered to Juliette homes as part of the two-year-long project will be bought from the Macon Water Authority (MWA).
Also included in the bond is just over $1 million to complete a pair of water projects approved prior to the Juliette water project becoming a priority earlier this year. One of those projects, in District 2, will run a line from Maynards Mill Road northbound on Hwy. 42 South to connect to a City of Forsyth line while the other project is in District 3 and includes Estes Road, Wadley Road and Cardiff Drive. In addition, just over $1.1 million will be dedicated to tying the county’s north water system to its south water system.
Lastly, included in the bond is just over $1.5 million in costs associated with constructing a new judicial building on L. Cary Bittick Drive to house the District Attorney’s Office and the Public Defender’s Office.
The bond will be repaid over 20 years at 2.09 percent interest. A bond closing will take place on July 2. Commission Chairman Greg Tapley said Monroe County would not have received as low an interest rate if the county finances weren’t in “great shape.”
Tapley said, “This is a big undertaking that we’re doing with this water project, but our purpose and enactment, a part of it is to promote the health, safety, morals, convenience, order, prosperity and general welfare of the unincorporated area of the county. So that’s what we’re doing today.”
District 1 Commissioner Larry Evans and District 4 Commissioner George Emami were absent from Thursday’s meeting.
The Monroe County Public Facilities Authority, which consists of the five commissioners, also approved the bond resolution by a 3-0 vote on Thursday, June 25.
