Garden City closer to city water access – therepublic.com

Another step has been taken that might eventually lead to Columbus city water being made available to Garden City residents.

Approval has been given by the Bartholomew County Commissioners for a local firm, Administrative Resources Association (ARa), to move ahead to apply for a $500,000 grant to bring municipal water to the Garden City Mobile Home Community LLC.

If funds can be obtained through the Indiana Office of Community and Urban Affairs, a line will be connected to a water treatment plant, and extend across property owned by Columbus Regional Health before it reaches Garden Street, which is in reach of the mobile home park, ARa Municipal Program manager Trena Carter said.

The quality of drinking water in the small town southwest of downtown Columbus has been a concern for several years. The Garden City Groundwater Plume site was placed on the U.S. Environmental Protection Agencys National Priorities List in December 2013.

This has been something that has been needed for some time, commissioners chairman Carl Lienhoop said.

While the mobile home park is hooked up to the city sewer system, it is not served by the citys water utility at present. Instead, the homes are served by shared wells where pollution has been a concern for several years.

Two years ago, federal environmental officials said they would spend $320,000 to clean up trichloroethylene (TCE) in the plume, and to continue with filtering water at several private wells at properties there. TCE, which is an industrial solvent, has been known to be a cause of cancer.

Although water tests taken in 2018 did not turn up any form of health risk, former Columbus Utilities Director Keith Reeves said at the time those tests might be inconclusive because some residents dont want their wells tested. He cited trust issues among residents who fear they will be forced to connect to city utilities and pay installation costs that exceed their means, said Reeves, who was succeeded by Scott Dompke after Reeves retirement.

Going door-to-door to a number of Garden City homes, most homeowners said they were satisfied with the shared wells after they installed a granular activated carbon (GAC) filter system. But some said they would prefer hooking up to city water if the cost was within their means.

Carter said her organization, which is working with the county commissioners, Columbus City Utilities and the mobile home park, is still in the preliminary stages of requesting the money.

There are a lot of processes that need to happen before we will be ready to go to full application, Carter said. But if everything aligns, we hope to apply for the funding by this November. If not, we would look at something for the first of next year.

The decision to have ARa seek funds for the water line comes one month after the Garden City Mobile Home Community used a split Columbus City Council vote to their advantage.

Because there was no council decision, the park was allowed to follow the recommendation of the planning commission to rezone the 1-acre site that is capable of holding up to eight new mobile homes.

But in that same month, the mobile home park agreed to planning staff recommendations that include not bringing in new mobile homes until after the city of Columbus annexes the property.

Other conditions the planning staff placed on the mobile home parks request include:

The subject property is to be combined with the existing mobile home park parcel and developed with shared access and amenities.

No new homes may be occupied until public water service has been established.

A 6-foot tall fence shall be constructed along the railroad tracks.

Direct access from the subject property to State Road 11 shall be limited to emergency and construction use only.

Additional State Road 11 right-of-way shall be dedicated along the frontage of the subject property.

A minimum of 3,400 square feet of open space, including picnic and playground amenities, shall be provided.

Having the water line run to the mobile home park is expected to be split between 46 or 47 residences, mobile home park owner Dana DelSignore said last month.

When asked if a line carrying city water might make it more affordable for other Garden City residents to hook up to city water, Carter said the answer to that question is beyond her level of expertise.

There may be a possibility others could come on, but thats not what this project is about, Carter said. Its about getting water to the mobile home community.

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Garden City closer to city water access - therepublic.com