Multimillion project to benefit town and aging lift stations
By Jon Johnson
PIMA – The Pima School District is building a new high school campus right off Highway 70 in Pima. While an effort has been made to ensure students will have a safe way to get to the campus, another infrastructure concern has the town thinking big fixes.
During the Pima Town Council’s September meeting, Pima Town Manager Vernon Batty advised the council regarding the town’s aging sewer lift stations that bring wastewater to its pond facility located north of Highway 70 and just east of Main Street. With the new school now having to be connected to the system as well, Batty suggested now would be the ideal time to upgrade.
“What we’re asking the town for today is the permission to go to WIFA to go out for a loan that would potentially, partially, forgiveable,” said Pima Town Manager Vernon Batty.
With the sewer pond being roughly directly north of the school, a plan to go underneath Ash Creek to make the straight northern route was engineered.
The problem, fiscally from the town’s perspective, is that to just run a connection from the school into the existing system would be about $484,000 while running the line from the school to the pond would be about $3.1 million.
That wouldn’t seem to benefit the town except that Pima has two lift stations that are in near-constant states of repair. With the new 15-inch pipeline from the school, the town can do away with multiple lift stations. The total cost to do all the upgrades would be roughly $6.74 million.
“For me, these options are fantastic,” Batty said.
The new sewer line would run down through farm fields and would create commercial hook-up possibilities in the future.
The council unanimously approved Batty’s application for WIFA loan forgiveness for the multi-million project and encouraged him to move forward.
Pima wastewater pond
While the upgrades will help take wastewater to the town’s treatment facility, the facility itself requires updating.
The heavy solids from the raw wastewater settle at the bottom of Pima’s anaerobic wastewater pond and are slowly digested by bacteria. Batty said that the town is nearing capacity for its sewer pond and the more that is added on only adds to that problem.
“So, what we really need to do, in my opinion, is look into the possibility of a wastewater treatment facility.”
The city of Safford runs its wastewater treatment facility that treats wastewater for non-potable reuse. The town of Thatcher has a wetland pond system.
Batty advised that ADEQ would likely be interested in approving a grant for the town for a project that would upgrade the sewer system to treat and reuse the water.
The town is hoping a new sewer line will be in use by the time the school is scheduled to open in fall 2025, and Batty said a new sewer facility could be a possibility in about five years.
