News Talk 94.1/AM 1600 Where The Upper Cumberland Talks
Annexed Cookeville residents voiced concern Thursday night about the city taking decades to provide sanitary sewer to their properties.
Residents from the area around East Highway 70 N and I-40 area spoke during the city’s annual public hearing for a plans of services progress report. Resident Martina Gabriel owns a restaurant and a hotel in the area and has attended the annual public hearing for several years.
“All the sewer systems are in my land,” Gabriel said. “And so I was hoping we could get at least some sort of timeline so we know we are not forgotten.”
Water Quality Control Director Barry Turner said annexed territories typically will receive the services if they have a high demand, if a developer can help with a cost share agreement, or if there is septic tank failure. Resident Lonnie Johnson said his property has had septic issues and had not yet told the city about them.
“I have one commercial building that I lease out,” Johnson said. “I’ve got to have somebody that don’t stay in the building because the septic tank won’t take it.”
City Manager James Mills said the city was not aware of the issues. He said now that they are, they hope to look at ways to address them.
“I’ll discuss this with Barry and see what we can do,” Mills said. “If there are septic tank failures, that does make it a priority to get sewer designs and sewer installed (…) So thank you for letting us know and we’ll be looking at that.”
Mills said the Plans of Services were drafted based on the input from the city attorneys at that time and were written in compliance with the attorney’s advice. Council Member Eric Walker said after hearing concerns from the citizens, he would like to see some prioritization for the territories that have been annexed the longest.
The council agreed this was a topic they would explore more in-depth.
