By Bonnie Culverhouse
Approval of a land swap with Webster Parish School Board will result in demolition of the Clerk Street Water Plant in the coming months.
During Monday’s meeting of the Minden City Council, it was voted unanimously to pursue the swap, as well as demolish the Clerk Street Water Plant, which is on property owned by Webster Parish School Board.
The swap will give Griffith Memorial Stadium, currently owned by the City of Minden, to the school board.
“Griffith is used almost exclusively by Minden High School’s baseball team, so it just makes sense,” Mayor Nick Cox said. “And it is close to Minden’s new softball stadium.”
Located near the softball stadium are the City’s Clerk Street Water Plant and water well.
“I believe we have the swap all worked out through surveys,” said the mayor. “There’s a little bit of attorney work to do, so we will pass this item pending attorney approval.”
Afterward, the council unanimously approved (pending the land swap agreement) decommissioning and leveling the Clerk Street Water Plant to make space for an improved water infrastructure project.
“Now that sounds scarier than it is,” Cox explained. “That plant was built in 1991. It has low water quality compared to what comes out of the other plant. So we don’t integrate that water into the system very often – just enough to keep it going.”
The “good water,” he said, comes from a location near the Steam Plant off Shreveport Road. It is on the “lower plane” and water to the new location will be pumped from there, bypassing the Victory Park pumps.
“We are in the process of working with the state for a Capital Outlay project where we can build a 2 million capacity groundwater storage tank that will cost around $3.4 million,” he said. “Our engineers have identified the best place to put that tank would be where the Clerk Street Water Plant is.”
The project is contingent on the Capital Outlay funds.
“We met with the Capital Outlay folks two weeks ago, and it’s looking very, very optimistic that we are going to be able to put this water capacity in,” Cox said. “That extra water capacity allows for a greater amount of expansion in our city, which we need in the northern plane.”
Cox said this project has been in the works since 2009. Originally, it was going to be constructed in the large lot behind the steam plant and on the corner of Sibley Road. It is now in Capital Outlay Priority One and the city has $678,000 readily available. Capital Outlay Priority Five shows $2.8 million that will be available as the project progresses.