EPA in the current fiscal year. According to representatives

EPA in the current fiscal year. According to representatives from the State Water Control Board, the worst possible case would be that construction money won’t become available until fiscal year 1984 (which begins in October, 1983).

Never has Sperryville had more favorable odds on getting outside help to clean up its problem of pollution in the Thornton River. The Health Department has been patient while waiting for the health hazard to be corrected as long as a solution was actively being pursued. If the grants fall through and Sperryville moves back to square one, the health officials have authority, in essence, to shut down the town. They haven’t said they would do so; only that they can. But we need to remember that the health Department forced a sandwich shop in the village to close a few years ago before the effort began to get a sewer system in place.

After more than six years of false starts and delays, the Sperryville sewer project now has an engineering plan that’s workable and a financing plan that community residents can afford. The State Water Control Board, the Health Department, the planning district staff have all invested so much time in this project that they’re working as hard as the Water and Sewer Authority and the engineers to see that it succeeds.

Inability to come up with the front money will mean the collapse of the effort and it will take a long time at best to put everything back together again.

Right now, all the systems say go and so should the supervisors. There’s a small risk that the grant funds will fall through but the chances that things will go wrong ..re slim. We urge the supervisors to remove the final snag by guaranteeing money for the final design work so that Sperryville can build its sewer system and we can once again have a clean Thornton River.

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