The Good Hope water treatment plant is seen in March 2022.

Good Hope and Garden City each are set to receive big funding boosts to assist in building up their water infrastructure, with Good Hope slated for more than $3.3 million and Garden City more than $650,000 in federal money administered through the Alabama Department of Environmental Management (ADEM).

The funding comes via unspent money allocated under terms of the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act of 2020, which ADEM has awarded to eligible programs that improve both drinking water and sewer infrastructure in communities statewide.

Good Hope received a pair of awards, each related to improving the city’s sewer infrastructure. The larger of the two is a $2,367,000 allocation for upgrades at its wastewater treatment plant, and will help alleviate the city’s obligation on a $4.7 million sewer bond; the other is a $947,300 allocation to help fund a sewer line expansion unrelated to the bond issue in an area on the city’s north side, near Scott Drive and Schaeffel Road.

Mayor Jerry Bartlett said the city’s residential growth, as well as increasing commercial interest in its developing County Road 222 corridor, has ramped up the urgency for Good Hope to address its sewer and waste water treatment capacity. “We have got to get our capacity up, and we have to do it as quick as we can,” said Bartlett. “Just as soon as we can get the engineers to draw it up and get it out to bid, the better it’ll be for us and for the people and businesses that are tied on.”

At Garden City, a $657,800 award will help upgrade a drinking water supply line that extends southward over the Mulberry River along U.S. Highway 31. “It’s going to tie in and go across the river bridge into Blount County,” explained mayor Tim Eskew.

“They have water on that side, but not an adequate supply. Right now, there’s not even a fire hydrant on the other side of the Mulberry in that immediate area. After we get done with this project, there’ ll be at least two.”

Leaders in both municipalities are reluctant to say whether the awards will fully fund the projects to which they’ve been allocated, noting recent volatility in the cost of materials as well as an engineering and construction timeline that will take at least several months to complete.

“It may be a year before they actually get to start on the work itself,” said Eskew, “so there’s no telling what all of it could cost in a year. We’re hoping to move quickly. As soon as that funding has been released, we plan to turn right around and get the work bidded out.”