Commission approves reallocation of $642,864 for St. John Parish wastewater plant demolition

The Louisiana Water Sector Commission approved a St. John the Baptist Parish request to reallocate $642,864.83 in remaining Water Sector funds to demolish the parish’s Woodland wastewater treatment plant, the commission said.

Officials from St. John told commissioners they completed the originally funded construction under budget and asked to reallocate the leftover funds to demolition of the older plant as part of a consolidation plan. Heather Paul, representing the administering division, said the change would not require additional Water Sector funds and that the Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ) had no objection.

"So essentially what's happening here is we came in under budget and rather than return the funds back to the Water Sector program, the request is just use those funds and expand your scope and do something else," said Reid Alexander of St. John of Baptist Power Utilities.

Commission members expressed mixed views. One member said the panel faces a backlog of high-priority projects and was "somewhat reluctant to approve $642,000 to go to an expanded scope versus some of the projects that we have that are not currently funded." The parish delegation argued the reallocation would allow the consolidation plan to be completed.

Senator Reese moved to approve the reallocation request; there was no objection and the motion passed by voice vote.

The commission’s file records show the reallocated funds will pay for demolition of the decommissioned plant and the routing of flows to a newer treatment facility; no new Water Sector dollars were requested. Commission members asked staff to review whether similar prior approvals (including a recent Donaldsonville scope change) had followed the same practice of reallocation; staff said they would check prior meeting records before applying the precedent broadly.