Friday, September 19, 2003

New reservior planned

By LINDSAY BIANCHI
Special to The Citizen

About five miles northeast of Palmetto on Bear Creek, The South Fulton Municipal Regional Water and Sewage Authority is planning to construct a drinking water reservoir, a raw water intake structure, a dam and water treatment facility to service the cities of Fairburn, Palmetto and Union City.

According to a joint public notice from the Savannah District Corps of Engineers and the State of Georgia, the 22.4 square mile area is seeing a lot of growth and the board consisting of members Ralph Moore, Betty Hannah, Clark Boddie, Adolph Snell, Jim Williams, James Harper and Alan Grindstaff have put their heads together to crate a solution for future water and sewage needs in South Fulton County.

A water supply study was conducted in December of 1997 and yielded two potential sites out of seven possible creeks. Bear Creek and Pea Creek seemed the most likely.

The site along Bear Creek was chosen to build the resevior which will provide 8 million gallons of water per day and 11 million gallons a day by the year 2050.

The Water and Sewage Authority intends to alleviate their activity in the area with wetland preservation and enhancement, stream preservation and restoration and buffer restoration. The proposed site include 16 perennial streams, 4 intermittent streams, 28 wetlands, 3 manmade open water areas and 6 ditches.

A bond issue in conjunction with the Bear Creek project has also been discussed. The sale of bonds are set for the week of October 15.