The City of Perryville received some special recognition Tuesday during the regular meeting of the city’s Board of Aldermen.
Ewell Lawson, COO and vice president of government and external affairs for the Missouri Public Untility Alliance, presented the city with its Robert E. Williams System Achievement Award for 2020.
The award is given in recognition of a member utility providing exceptional quality of improvements in service to its customers.
“Years ago, Perryville’s leaders made decisions that were for the long-term benefit of the community and its citizens by forming a hometown utility to serve the community,” Lawson said. “Those benefits are easy to tell about in a few words, but their impact is huge.”Lawson went on to explain that the city was chosen for pioneering Missouri’s new ‘design-build’ construction process for its planned new wastewater treatment plant.
Once complete, the project will be Missouri’s first city wastewater project constructed under the state’s newly-approved design-build process.
MPUA CEO and president John Twitty offered his congratualtions. “MPUA congratulates Perryville for utility system improvement that will have a profound effect on reliability and service for its citizens, businesses and industry.”
The Perryville plant will replace an older trickling-filter wastewater process with a more modern, higher capacity and environmentally effective facility.
The proposed budget for the project, which is expected to be complete in 2022, is $23 million.
Design-build became an available option for wastewater projects under a 2016 statute passed by the Missouri general assembly, allowing projects to be procured through a single contract with a contractor that has responsibility for both the design and construction of a facility. Use of the design-build process allows communities to develop and rebuild infrastructure faster and at lower cost compared to typical construction delivery methods.
