New connection cures sewer ills in West Fork

WEST FORK — West Fork residents can count on safe, reliable sewage service and possibly more commercial development now that the city is connected to the Fayetteville wastewater system.

West Fork Mayor Heith Caudle said the sewer lines and a pump station connecting the two cities were activated in mid-December after nearly a decade of overflows and other problems linked to an aging sewer treatment plant.

Caudle said the $10 million project, which includes replacing some sewer lines in West Fork, provides safe, reliable service to 800 customers and room for growth. He said the availability of sewer service along the transmission line has already sparked interest from developers.

“We are good for the next 20 years,” Caudle said. “We’re also seeing a lot of interest in West Fork. This opens up about 5 miles of Highway 71 frontage to sewer access that didn’t have any before.”

State inspectors found solid waste overflowing into the White River in early 2014 during heavy rain. The river flows into Beaver Lake, the source of drinking water for most of Northwest Arkansas.

The state fined West Fork $27,500, which was later reduced to $16,500, and ordered the city to stop unpermitted discharges and clean the area near the plant. The unpermitted discharges continued to be reported during heavy rain in the area.

A report in early 2020 noted the fecal coliform bacteria leaving the plant was 43,750% above the allowed seven-day average limit. The report said the sewage was likely making its way into the river.

West Fork agreed in a 2014 consent administrative order with the state to improve its infrastructure and to begin work to connect to Fayetteville’s system.

Caudle said West Fork has spent more than $2 million replacing sewer lines inside the city and has three more small replacement projects to be done. Those projects should cost about $750,000, he said. The city also received about $8 million in loans from the state for the project. The city’s $5.5 million share of the $10 million total cost will be repaid through rates charged to customers, he said.

Caudle said the city approved rate increases that added about $28 a month to the minimum sewer bill over two years, bringing the monthly cost to about $45. The rates then increase depending on the amount of water used by the customer over the 2,000 gallons allowed for the minimum bill.

About 8 miles of sewer transmission lines were built between West Fork and Fayetteville. Caudle said the system is a gravity-flow line for about half the distance, and a pump station was built to boost the wastewater the remainder of the way to the treatment plant.

Tim Nyander, Fayetteville’s utilities director, said the connection has gone smoothly. He said the system has been receiving between 160,000 and 200,000 gallons of wastewater daily from West Fork.

Nyander said the wastewater treatment system has enough capacity to handle the projected growth in the area until at least 2040. Fayetteville also provides wastewater treatment services to Elkins, Farmington, Greenland and the southern part of Johnson. The northern part of Johnson is served by Springdale.

Lane Crider, chief executive officer for the Beaver Water district, said completion of the project is good news for all of Northwest Arkansas.

“We are very pleased that they have finally connected with Fayetteville,” Crider said. “It’s for the benefit of the water quality in the West Fork of the White River.”

Crider said he hopes the connection between West Fork and Fayetteville is a step toward greater regional cooperation in wastewater treatment, something he said is essential given the cost of building and maintaining such facilities.

“These smaller towns and communities just don’t have the resources to put toward these facilities,” Crider said, pointing to Bethel Heights as another example.

Voters approved the annexation of Bethel Heights into Springdale on Aug. 11, 2020. A group of Bethel Heights residents, frustrated by the ineffective operation of the city’s waste water treatment system, put the annexation issue on the ballot, according to Charlene Bowen, who sponsored the petition drive.

The treatment system had operated in violation of its state permit for more than 10 years, letting untreated sewage flow into neighboring yards when the system became overwhelmed, according to records of the Arkansas Division of Environmental Quality.

The Springdale Water and Sewer Commission is considering a $1.5 million plan to permanently connect Bethel Heights with Springdale and clean up the Bethel Heights treatment fields starting late this year.