Published: May 28, 2009 11:14 am      

The right priority — 05/29/09

Stimulus funds target city’s greatest infrastructure need

The $400,000 loan Ashland has received from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act is an excellent use of federal stimulus funds that attacks the most serious infrastructure problem in the city: Aging sewer lines. Not only will the loan — 50 percent of which will be forgiven — benefit city residents by reducing the cost of federally mandated improvements to its sewer lines, but it will benefit other river communities by reducing the amount of untreated sewage Ashland dumps into the Ohio River during heavy rainfalls.

Ashland will use the loan to help finish the Putnam Street Sewer Improvement project. The city already has budgeted $400,000 and the loan will enable city to do more with that money and help speed the completion of the city’s sewer problems.

The Putnam Street sewer runs approximately 4,000-feet from the AK Steel Coke Plant along U.S. 23 to Putnam Street. City Manager Steve Corbitt, an engineer, called the 37th Street overflow, which the Putnam Street sewer feeds into, one of the city’s worst sewer problems. The line — which was laid decades ago — has many cracks which allow water to flow into the city’s waste treatment system and overwhelm it during heavy rains. Unable to treat the volume of sewage and rain water coming into the city’s treatment plant during those periods, untreated sewage is dumped into the Ohio River.

Replacing ancient sewer lines that are underground and unseen is not the type of public works project that gains elected officials many votes. But too often in the past elected officials have opted for more visible projects and ignored maintenance on existing infrastructure. That’s why the levees that collapsed in New Orleans following Hurricane Katrina had not been repaired despite approval of funding to do so.

There are other public improvement projects that Ashland certainly could do, but they all pale compared to the need to replace ancient sewer and water lines. Even without the grant, Ashland had been ordered by the U.S. Environment Protection Agency to replace its oldest sewer lines. The grant simply means that city will have to shift less of the cost of those required improvements on its own water and sewer customers in the form of rate increases. Rates still likely will have to be increased but not by as much as they would have been.

There is reason for concern over the wisdom of the $787 billion stimulus package approved by Congress to boost the economy. Simply put, it is spending money that the government does not have. We are borrowing from our grandchildren and great-grandchildren to pay for today’s programs.

But we disagree with those communities that are refusing to accept the stimulus money because they oppose the stimulus bill. The money is going to be spent somewhere, and it would be foolish to turn it down. And at least in Ashland we can say, without reservation, that the money is being well spent to meet a real need.