News Talk 94.1/AM 1600 Where The Upper Cumberland Talks
A Cookeville resident wants the city to expand sewer to her property after it was annexed nearly 20 years ago.
Martina Gabriel owns property along East Spring Street which includes Fiesta Cancun. She said the city hasn’t expanded sewer connections to the area since being annexed.
“We were annexed in 2001, and of course our expectation was city sewer in 20 years,” Gabriel said, “which I expect and I hope that you guys are starting to plan on it because it needs to go into the planning stage.”
Gabriel addressed Cookeville’s City Council during last week’s meeting, after Planning Director James Mills updated Council with progress reports on plans of services for several annexed areas.
Gabriel told Council she understands the challenges involved in such a project, but wants what she said was promised to her.
“We know it’s difficult to get across Interstate 40, but we do expect that eventually the city will keep the promise from when they annexed us,” Gabriel said.
Mills responded to Gabriel by noting no specific dates were provided during the creation of the annexation’s plan of services.
“Our report deals with what was provided in the individual plan of services,” Mills said. “Some had no specific date on sewer. Part of the reason for that, some of the years we annexed had fairly new developments. It didn’t really make a lot of sense to add that expense for sewer if people weren’t going to add on sewer… for most, sewer’s the only thing left to be provided.”
Council members unanimously approved the annual progress report on the plans of services for the annexation areas. Annexations mentioned in the report include the South Willow Avenue, East Highway 70N and Interstate 40, and Bunker Hill Road areas.
