Austin city council to vote on $120M in loans for significant water infrastructure projects
AUSTIN (KXAN) -- Thursday, Austin City Council is expected to vote on three separate loan applications that would bring in as much as $120 million to the city of Austin for several major water infrastructure projects.
"There are three pretty good sized items on the agenda...all three of them relate to the city of Austin asking the Water Development Board for low interest loans, in some instances zero interest loans, so that we can make certain improvements to our system," Austin Mayor Kirk Watson said.
The first asks the city manager to file an application with the Texas Water Development Board for an up to $45 million loan so that Austin Water can replace polybutylene pipes.
"We know from work that we've done both with the water utility and with the Auditor's Office that one of the biggest areas of where we have leaks -- which, of course, we don't want to have, because that loses valuable, precious water -- is in the piping that goes from the city water main to the meter people use their homes," Watson said of that item.
Another would ask the city manager to request up to $10 million for a project that would allow additional re-use of water through the Travis Heights Reclaimed Water Main, which services near downtown Austin.
"That's important for a couple things, because we're capable of using, and want to use non-potable water, non-drinkable water for things like irrigation, things like how you cool buildings. And so that would allow us to upgrade that system significantly," Watson explained.
The third is for up to $65 million that would allow the city to create flood protections at Austin Water’s Walnut Creek wastewater treatment plant.
"In at least two of the three instances that I'm talking about, a big part of what we're doing is we're also addressing extreme weather conditions, you know, things like flooding that could impact the Walnut Creek wastewater treatment facility. And it's been because we've seen changes in those flood maps," Watson said.