City approves Greenbelt deal

The City of Clarendon will sell groundwater to the Greenbelt Water Authority, and the $1.2 million project will be financed with bonds issued in the city’s name but paid for by the water authority.

Clarendon Aldermen in their regular meeting May 29 unanimously approved the contract to sell groundwater to Greenbelt.

The agreement was approved by the Greenbelt board of directors on May 17.

Officials say the contract includes a price of 45 cents per thousand gallons that the authority will pay the city. The price will be renegotiated every three years.

Greenbelt General Manager Bobbie Kidd also presented aldermen with information about the city issuing the bonds to refurbish the city’s old water wells and lay a pipeline to the authority’s filter plant, telling the board it would be the quickest and easiest way to get the project off the ground.

“If we have to go through TCEQ (the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality) and the water development board, it will take seven to nine months,” Kidd said. “It will take about two months if the city does it, and Greenbelt can go ahead and use its emergency reserve money to start the project now.”

Kidd and City Administrator Lambert Little said bonding agents and bonding attorneys had come to the same conclusion that this was the quickest and best route to go.

“Greenbelt can issue the bonds, but there are a lot of hurdles and a lot of red tape,” Kidd said. “The city has none of that. The legislature has basically given you the authority to issue bonds whenever you need to.”

Little said the only downside would be that it might impact the city’s ability to issue any other long-term debt, but that in the long run it would strengthen the city’s bond rating. The city would be contractually absolved of any liability to pay the bonds.

Kidd said he is planning on a ten-year payout for the bonds, and that the wholesale cost of water for Greenbelt’s member cities was likely to increase from $1.82 per 1,000 gallons to $2.03. But he also said Clarendon would be benefiting financially from the sale of raw groundwater to Greenbelt.

The board voted unanimously to issue the bonds in the city’s name.

In other city business, the board discussed whether it should meet more frequently than once a month. Alderman Tommy Hill said he felt aldermen would be better informed with one more meeting per month, and he moved to have the board meet twice a month. Aldermen approved the motion but agreed to review the change in the future.