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Rep. Jennifer Wexton (D-VA-10) toured the Purcellville Surface Water Treatment Plant on Friday, March 25 to learn how the town’s $10 million in American Rescue Plan Act funding will help secure the town’s drinkable water—and how much more help is needed.

More than $8 million of that funding will go toward the town’s water and sewer infrastructure, including rehabilitating the town’s J.T. Hirst reservoir, constructing a new half-million-gallon water storage tank, and replacing the water main from the water treatment plant, which is a mile from town limits on the town-owned Aberdeen property.

The half-million-gallon tank is planned to let the town take the current million-gallon tank out of service for rehabilitation—that tank has been in service since 1945. Meanwhile, the 12-inch water line from the reservoir to the town, now to be replaced, has been in service since 1961.

The plant’s staff of nine serves the town’s nearly 10,000 residents and Woodgrove High School, and can treat almost 600,000 gallons of water in day. But some of the equipment in the more than 30-year-old water treatment plant is so old that parts for it aren’t even made any more, Water Superintendent Bernie Snyder said. The town is still working to estimate the much larger cost of replacing the water treatment plant.

“It’s amazing what they’ve managing to do with some equipment that is rapidly aging, and no longer state of the art. I’m glad that ARPA has been able to help them so far, but it seems that they’re going to need some more help,” Wexton said after the tour.

Wexton pointed ahead to funding from the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, signed into law late last year.

“There’s so much need around the country, and I think that the infrastructure bill will go a long way to help take care of some of these really acute projects, but a lot of it’s going to come down to making sure that the state distributes it fairly,” Wexton said. SHARE ONWhatsAppFacebookTwitterLinkedInGoogle+Pin ItEmailBuffer Related

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