Refinancing current water debt to save $1.8M

With construction on Lake McIntosh expected to begin this fall, Fayette County is planning to issue $16.5 million in bonds to pay for the remainder of the project.

At the same time the county expects to refinance current bonds and pay off several loans, all incurred for the water system, at a net savings of $1.8 million, said County Manager Jack Krakeel. The county commission is holding a special called meeting Wednesday night at 6:30 p.m. to consider issuing the necessary bonds.

The county has already spent about $6.5 million to acquire mitigation property and accomplish other tasks for Lake McIntosh.

The lake, which will straddle the Fayette-Coweta county line via the damming of Line Creek, is the final reservoir planned for Fayette and will cover the county’s growth into the 2030-2040 time range.

The county already has operational reservoirs in lakes Kedron, Peachtree and Horton.

Fayette has already completed the pre-qualification of firms who will bid for the construction project, Krakeel said. The county is waiting on the results of a review of the dam construction plans by the Georgia Department of Natural Resources, which is expected back perhaps in the next 30 to 45 days, he explained.

Construction on the project is expected to take between 18 and 24 months, but it could take as long as 30 months from the groundbreaking for the lake pool to fill, depending on the weather, Krakeel noted.

Lake McIntosh has been in the works since the 1970s when county officials acquired the vast majority of property needed for the project.

The lake will be reached off an access road leading eastward from the current terminus of TDK Boulevard in Peachtree City.

Several years ago there was a strong movement to extend TDK Boulevard into Coweta County including construction of a bridge over Line Creek. But that project was quashed by a citizen uproar after a Coweta developer announced plans for a mega-development that would have fed a significant amount of traffic onto the TDK Boulevard extension and Ga. Highway 74 in Peachtree City.

Krakeel said the county has no plans to extend the lake access road to reach Coweta County. The road will not go beyond the dam and raw water intake area, he said.

While other communities in Georgia have struggled due to drought in recent years, Fayette has managed to stay ahead of the curve, keeping a 200-day water supply on hand even during the worst of the latest drought, Krakeel said.