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More sewage coming to Boardman
YOUNGSTOWN
The Mahoning County commissioners have approved a $159,010 consulting engineering agreement with URS Corp. of Akron for the third and final phase of an upgrade to the Boardman sewage-treatment plant on East Parkside Drive.
The upgrade and expansion is being performed in preparation for the closing of the New Middletown sewage-treatment plant, which must shut down by June 2016 because of an Ohio Environmental Protection Agency order.
The EPA says Honey Creek has insufficient water flow to continue accepting the effluent discharged by the New Middletown plant.
When the New Middletown plant closes, all of the sewage flow now going to it will be pumped to the Boardman plant, which discharges its effluent into Mill Creek.
The addition of the New Middletown area sewage will increase the amount of daily sewage flow processed at the Boardman plant by 10 percent to 15 percent over its present level, said Bill Coleman, office manager at the county sanitary engineer’s office.
Coleman said he doesn’t expect the additional sewage processed at the Boardman plant to have an adverse effect on Mill Creek’s water quality.
“We do not believe that it will have a negative impact on the creek because of the high standard of effluent being discharged from Boardman,” he said of the Boardman sewage treatment plant.
“There should not be a significant change in the effluent going into the creek, and there should be no noticeable change for anyone that deals with the creek,” he said.
“There should be no odors,” from the plant in the Parkside Drive residential neighborhood, he added.
On Friday, the commissioners also approved advertising for bids for demolition of two vacant Boardman houses, 287 Oakley Ave., and 3923 Hopkins Road, at an estimated combined cost of $21,000, including asbestos abatement.
The demolitions will be paid for through the federally funded Community Development Block Grant program, said Annemarie DeAscentis, a budget specialist in the commissioners’ office.
The commissioners also approved spending $14,447 for airfare, lodging, meals and registration for six employees in the payroll, purchasing, information-technology and auditor’s offices to attend the annual Tyler Connect conference May 3-6, in Atlanta.
Tyler Technologies is the sponsor of the county’s Munis payroll, financial accounting, purchasing and dog-licensing computer system.
“This is to keep the staff of the county, who are related to the system, and who are the main workers of the system up on the new technology and what’s happening with the system,” and enable them to meet other system users, said Audrey Tillis, county budget director.