County Clerk Tacie Williams said that all the changes pertain to the water budget.During its first budget hearing Monday, December 13th, The Jasper City Council reviewed the major changes that occurred between the first presentation of the proposed 2012 budget and the hearing. County Clerk Tacie Williams said that all the changes pertain to the water budget, where all other departments retained the same or similar numbers as were given at the initial presentation.

Earlier in the year the City had planned on completing several water line projects for 2012. However, according to Monday night’s discussion, the larger Liberty Lane water project will consume too much time for the City to complete the other, smaller water line projects as well. Williams explained,

“The City is actually going to run the line from Liberty Lane on 515 all the way down to 108 and at some point we’re actually going to cross 515 and go back down the other side of 515, which is going to be a major project using our crews.”

She said the project will likely take several months and that it wasn’t

“realistic to have all these other water line replacements in the budget this year because we’re simply not going to have time to get to them.”

Elaborating on the situation, Mayor John Weaver added,

“The line in Camp Road is in the Budget, but we’re going to wait and see if we can feed the tank with our existing infrastructure, since we’re already there without having to build a new line.”

Weaver said, though, that this line does need to be replaced, but said that it may not happen next year.

“We’ve kept them (the smaller water line projects) on the list,”

Williams said and that they are important and that the City will review them again in 2013.

Regarding the water tank project, Williams explained that the project would exceed the one million dollars in grant money that the City initially received for the project, giving them a shortfall in this area.

“With the land purchase and to build the tank, it’s actually going to cost $1,148,593 ,”

she clarified,

“That puts us at a $148,593 overage on that project.”

As such, Williams explained that $60, 920 that will come out of 2012’s capital and that the City will not get reimbursed from the GEFA (Georgia Environmental Finance Authority) Grant. Back in September, the project was discussed at length, but parts of the project have changed since then. For instance, in September Williams warned of the window for receiving the GEFA grant, which since then has closed. Also, since September the Council has decided to postpone the smaller water line projects, which were primarily line replacements. These changes suggest that, perhaps, more changes are to come.

The City will soon hold a final budget hearing to officially adopt the 2012 Budget. A time and date for the meeting, though, has yet to be announced, but is expected to be scheduled by the end of the month.