The city of Starkville could begin a storm water control project adjacent to the Green Oaks subdivision as soon as this summer.
After a day of heavy rains, the Starkville Board of Aldermen Tuesday night declared the drainage issues which have plagued Maple Drive since the 1970s a threat to the health, safety and welfare of local residents. With the declaration, the city now has authority to enter private property between Highway 12 and Maple Drive to attempt to alleviate the flooding problem.
City Engineer Edward Kemp envisions a project that would increase the capacity of a retention pond located above Maple Drive, which overflows during heavy rains and sends water rushing down a hill toward the Green Oaks neighborhood. Kemp also is drawing up plans for a concrete channel which will send retention pond overflow downhill toward Stark Road instead of Maple Drive.
With the Board of Aldermen”s declaration Tuesday night, Kemp said the city will begin acquiring easements as soon as possible. Construction could begin as soon as this summer or early fall, he said.
Ward 1 Alderman Ben Carver urged his fellow board members to vote in favor of the declaration and said he hopes it will help the city alleviate a flooding problem which has forced one woman to move out of her home. Three homes along Maple Drive flooded after heavy rains hit Starkville on New Year”s Eve.
“It”s gotten worse out there,” Carver said. “There are definitely health and safety concerns.”
While the board voted unanimously in favor of the declaration, Ward 6 Alderman Roy A. Perkins said he hopes the city in the future will look equally favorably upon other drainage projects, such as an overgrown ditch along Carver Drive. The board last year approved a project in which a pipe was installed and covered along 40 feet of the Carver Drive ditch. The ditch is approximately 850 feet long.
Perkins urged the board to keep the remaining section of the Carver Drive ditch in mind.
“Please be reminded there are health, safety and welfare issues at other ditches throughout the city,” Perkins said.
In other business Tuesday, aldermen approved the conditional use request of Tabor Construction and Development group to construct eight condominiums on the second floor of The Creamery at Central Station, located at the corner of Lampkin Street and Montgomery Street. Tabor also is considering commercial use or a combination of both in the space.
Additionally, aldermen Tuesday approved the minutes of their Jan. 4 meeting, at which the board approved a list of streets to be exempt from the city”s sidewalk ordinance and sidewalk construction requirements. Mayor Parker Wiseman vowed to veto the exemptions after the Jan. 4 meeting minutes were approved and the action was made official.
Wiseman said he plans to issue his veto today. The board would need at least five votes to override Wiseman.
The ordinance amendments, which exempted Miley Drive, Pollard Road and portions of Airport Road and Industrial Park Road from sidewalk construction requirements, were approved by the board 4 to 3, with only Ward 2 Alderwoman Sandra Sistrunk, Ward 4 Alderman Richard Corey and Ward 5 Alderman Jeremiah Dumas voting in opposition.
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