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Richland Flushes Openness About Sewer Plant Work 
BY NICK MCCORMACWhile Richland County Council is hardly a picture of corruption — the kind of crooked backroom-dealing politicians one sees in movies — an executive session the council heldto discuss a county-operated wastewater treatment plant begs a question:Why did County Council conduct a closed-door meeting about a sewer plant in themiddle of a Monday afternoon?Trying to avoid attention was never the goal, says Councilman Greg Pearce. Rather, hesays, that just happened to be the occasion the council scheduled to discuss design andmonetary challenges regarding the plant.Perhaps, but the county is being tight lipped about precisely what those challenges are,and so is a company Richland County is paying millions of dollars to remedy them.The June 22 executive session brought council members together with the county’s legalteam and administrators to discuss planned improvements to the sewer plant, which islocated on the Broad River.The would-be upgrades date back to 2006. That year, the S.C. Department of Health andEnvironmental Control declared that the plant was not operating adequately and issued anorder requiring structural upgrades to the facility.The improvements were designed to have the plant treat a larger volume of sewage at ahigher level to meet new standards DHEC had set, according to Thom Berry, aspokesman for the agency.County Council issued a $27 million construction contract to a local firm, Power Engineering, to do the work. But design changes on the part of the engineers and higher than expected costs resulted in setbacks.In the interim, the plant is operating but not at full capacity.“We had a timeline for all the upgrades we needed to make but there were some issueswith the developer changing design plans and that put us back a bit,” says TonyMcDonald, assistant county administrator. McDonald attributes some of the delays to aspike in fuel costs last summer.In a July 21 meeting, County Council approved yet another change to the design plans.Council members said they hope it will be the last alteration before the upgrades arecompleted.Pearce says that getting too specific about the issue could compromise the county’s legal position.
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