Lometa receives $350,000 subsidy

The city of Lometa recently received a $350,000 grant from the state Office of Rural Community Affairs for improvements and additions to the Lower Colorado River Authority water supply that serves the city.

The grant, which comes with $35,350 in LCRA matching funds, will cover the cost of building a secondary transmission line. Regan Lenehan, GrantWorks project manager, said construction will add about 6,500 linear feet of six-inch water main.

Construction will take place along County Road 2509 as workers replace meters and about 28 deteriorated yard lines. The number of yard lines and the amount of water main built, however, may change because of fluctuating prices.

"Obviously, construction costs can change," Ms. Lenehan said.

"This is just our best guess based on construction costs at the time we put in the application."

The project also will create a loop for Lometa's water supply, said Mayor David Ivey. This will eliminate a dead-end where water was stagnating and had to be drained.

Citizens of low and moderate income will receive better service once the project has been completed, Ivey said. "It won't service all the low- and moderateincome (residents), but they are the ones who primarily are going to benefit," the mayor said.

The contractor for the project will be selected by a competitive bidding process. Construction must be completed by July 3, 2009, as a condition of the ORCA grant.

The grant falls under ORCA's 2007 program year. ORCA received 667 applications statewide and plans to fund approximately 300 in the 2007-08 cycle. Twenty applications came from Lometa's region, Central Texas Council of Governments, and ORCA expects to fund nine. Lometa ranked third among regional applications.

Tabor and Associates will serve as the engineering firm for the project.