Cedar-Knox Rural Water goes full steam ahead with S.D. contract
HARTINGTON – Plans for the future of the Cedar-Knox Rural Water Project continue to flow forward in 2024.
The City Commission of Yankton, S.D., approved a contract June 10 with the Lewis & Clark Natural Resources Board of Directors that will hook Cedar-Knox on to the municipal water system, which includes a treatment plant.
The Lewis & Clark Natural Resources District (NRD) board approved entering the contract with the City of Yankton May 23.
Scott Fiedler, Cedar-Knox project manager, said the agreement will be for 50 years and will start out with an allocation of 1.75 million gallons a day.
Cedar-Knox serves more than 900 rural connections – about 7,000 people – across parts of northern Cedar and Knox counties, including several sanitary improvement districts, recreational areas and businesses along Lewis and Clark Lake and the Missouri River.
Communities impacted by the Cedar-Knox water contract include Crofton, Fordyce, St. Helena and Obert.
The rural water system, which is overseen by the Lewis & Clark NRD, currently pulls water from the river in the Devils Nest region of Knox County.
Silt and Cedar-Knox’s age – it dates back to the early 1980s – have become major issues, however, and the rural water system needed to find another water source sooner than later.
Fiedler said construction contracts are being drawn up for distribution upgrades for Cedar- Knox – such as increasing the size of 24-26 miles of the rural water system’s current pipelines – and the replacement of a water storage tank north of Hartington.
For the pipeline part of the estimated $28 million project, work is expected to start this fall if a contract is approved.
Abbott, Arne, Schwindt Inc., a company based in Moorhead, Minn., that builds rural water infrastructure, would be in charge of the construction.
The price of just the pipeline portion of the project is estimated at about $7.25 million.
“Hopefully, we’ll have a nice fall like we did last year and they can get started in the fall,” Fiedler said, adding a mild winter and an early start to spring next year would be helpful as well for the work.
The replacement of the water storage tank near Hartington is expected to cost nearly $1.2 million.
That work would be handled by Caldwell, a company based in Louisville, Ky., that specializes in water storage projects.
“We’ve been having a lot of issues with that tank,” Fiedler said. “We can really only use the top 20 to 30 feet of water in that tank. After that, we lose head pressure in that tank and customers can start getting less pressure. The water at the bottom of the pipe doesn’t get utilized.”
The current water storage tank – a ground-level blue silo known as a standpipe – can hold about 235,000 gallons and would be replaced by an elevated tank – a water tower – that can contain about 125,000 gallons.
“It holds less gallons, but more usable gallons,” Fiedler said. “The advantage of an elevated tank is we can use all of the water, and it keeps fresher water in it.”
The elevated water storage tank would be the same height – 90 feet tall – as the current standpipe it would replace.
“(The water tower) needs to be that height to have enough pressure to push water over the hills,” Fiedler said, referring to the geography of northern Cedar and Knox counties.
Future construction for Cedar-Knox includes boring under the Missouri River and installing pipelines and other infrastructure to hook on to Yankton’s municipal water system.
“That needs to be engineered and designed yet,” Fiedler said, adding he would like to see physical work on that part of the project start next year. “I’d like to see it wrapped up in three years or less.”
The Lewis & Clark NRD board is next scheduled to meet at 7 p.m. June 20 and likely will have a discussion on Cedar-Knox agenda items.