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City staff outline water-tower rehab schedule; Port tank work to finish this year
Summary
City staff told the Planning and Infrastructure GIS Committee that work to rehab multiple water towers will begin in October, with the Port tank expected online by year-end; a carbon-silo repair will cost about $250,000 after retrofitting saved roughly $500,000 versus full replacement.
City staff reported progress on several water-system projects and laid out a tentative schedule for tank rehabilitations and equipment upgrades, saying work on the West Shreveport tank could begin in October and the Port tank should be completed this year.
The committee was told the West Shreveport tank — in Councilwoman Bowman's district — is planned to be taken offline for rehabilitation “tentatively starting for October,” and if schedules hold crews will move next to the Saint Vincent tank the following October. Brandon Snead, a city staff member who briefed the committee, said Seventeenth and Pines has been completed and the Port tank is wrapping up piping, valves and painting with a new port logo.
Snead said the city reconditioned its carbon silo following an algae bloom and opted to retrofit the silo’s internal feed system rather than replace the entire unit. He told the committee replacing the silo would have cost about $750,000; work on the inner feed system is contracted at roughly $250,000 and is scheduled to start in October. Snead said the contractor will bring in a temporary feed system while the silo is taken offline to avoid disruption to taste-and-odor control.
The staff update also mentioned an ongoing SCADA (Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition) upgrade. Committee members asked how the contractor was selected for tank painting; Snead said the construction contract followed the city’s purchasing process and went to the lowest responsive bidder, naming Dixie Painting as the awardee and that artist selection for tank artwork had been run through the Shreveport Regional Arts Council (a separate panel), not as part of the construction award.
Council members pressed for documentation about the bid process and asked staff to resend bid packages and award letters to council members who said they had not received them. Snead said he had emailed the materials after the July meeting and would forward them again.
The update included no formal vote on the projects themselves. Committee members asked for continued detail on contract selection, schedules and any committees used for design or artwork selection.
City staff did not provide a firm date for completion of all tanks but said, if all goes as planned, the series of rehabs could be finished in a year and a half to two years.
