Council awards Greenwood plant construction contract and accepts $15M GLO resiliency grant

The City Council approved a construction contract for major upgrades at the Greenwood Wastewater Treatment Plant and accepted a $15,000,000 grant from the Texas General Land Office (GLO) to improve operational resiliency at the Greenwood and Oso wastewater treatment plants.

Jeff Edmonds, director of engineering services, explained the contract award process and told council members staff had flagged bid irregularities with the low bidder. Edmonds said the low bidder did not strictly meet the city’s five-year-in-business preference, but that a subsequent administrative review documented the firm’s experienced personnel and financial capacity and that awarding the contract to the low bidder produced significant savings versus the next bidder. City management recommended awarding the contract and asking council to waive procedural irregularities; legal staff recommended council action to reduce litigation risk.

Wesley Nevigan, director of water systems infrastructure, said the Greenwood upgrades move the plant from anaerobic to aerobic treatment processes — a change he said should reduce odors that have affected nearby neighborhoods. Nevigan also said the GLO grant is targeted primarily at flood mitigation (lifting or protecting pump rooms, flood proofing influent/effluent areas) and adding on-site power generation to keep plants operating during storms.

Nevigan told council the Greenwood treatment improvements (a separate capital project discussed elsewhere on the agenda) are expected to take multiple years; he also said engineers hope to convert process trains to aerobic operation “about a year into the project,” accelerating odor mitigation for nearby residents.

Councilmember questions focused on project timing and the relationship between the GLO grant and the larger Greenwood treatment project. Nevigan said the $15 million GLO award will fund flood-mitigation and standby-power items and is complementary to — not duplicative of — planned treatment-process improvements that are part of a larger, separately budgeted project expected to cost in the tens of millions of dollars.

Edmonds and city staff said the contract award to the selected contractor (RAVA Construction) was legally defensible after the administrative review; the council voted to approve the contract award and the related resolution waiving irregularities and accepting the GLO grant.

Council members asked staff to provide an account of work completed under the federal consent decree and the status of outstanding obligations; staff agreed to provide the breakdown.

The measures passed by council will move forward to procurement and construction planning; staff said timelines and phasing details would be returned to council in coming weeks.