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Official touts sewer project
Completion of a $4.25 million sanitary sewer installation will improve quality of life, raise homeowners’ property values and bolster economic development potential, the township administrator said.
“Sewer lines, gas lines, waterlines — any utility — makes any community more attractive to businesses. This can only benefit us. It can never hurt us,” said James Scharville, Poland Township administrator.
Scharville was referring to the South Struthers Interceptor Sewer, which will eliminate 165 septic systems, many of them failing after having been in use for more than 50 years.
The project includes installation of nearly five miles of plastic sewer pipe, carrying sewage to the Struthers sewage treatment plant.
The installation is being paid for by $1.2 million in Army Corps of Engineers funds obtained by U.S. Rep. Tim Ryan, D-17th, of Niles, with the remainder of the money coming from county sewer permit revenues.
The project was first proposed more than 25 years ago, but it didn’t proceed to construction until recently because not all of the needed funding was in place, Scharville said.
Phase 1 of the installation, built by Rudzik Excavating of Struthers and serving Struthers, Kennedy and Arrel-Smith roads, was completed last September. It serves 64 customers.
Phase 2, which will serve 101 customers on Poland Center Drive, James Street, Luteran Lane and part of U.S. Route 224, is still under construction.
Phase 2 also includes upgrades to the existing Park Place pump station, which are still to be completed.
All of the new sewer pipe has already been buried under Poland Center Drive, James Street and Luteran Lane by Dave Sugar Excavating Inc. of Petersburg.
“All those streets where we excavated will be fully blacktopped and be in first-class condition when the project is complete,” Lyden said.
Workers from Susany Construction Co. of North Lima recently have been boring to install new sewer pipe under U.S. Route 224 under the supervision of MS Consultants Inc., the Youngstown engineering firm that designed the project.
Construction of Phase 2 began at the end of April and is expected to be completed three to four months from now, Lyden said.
Information about the project, guidelines for low-interest loans to help pay homeowners’ connection costs and a list of licensed connection installers are available at the township hall, 3339 Dobbins Road, and at the sanitary engineer’s office, 761 Industrial Road, Youngstown.
It will cost $1,300 for a three-bedroom, single-family dwelling to connect to the sewer, with the cost rising as the number of bedrooms increases.
The sewer rate will be $6.60 per 1,000 gallons of water used, plus a fixed monthly rate of $5.75 per customer.