Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, May 13, 1990 TAG: 9005110421
SECTION: CURRENT PAGE: NRV9 EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY
SOURCE: CATHRYN McCUE NEW RIVER VALLEY BUREAU
DATELINE: CHRISTIANSBURG LENGTH: Medium
Plant manager Bob Hoover said Corning asked for the switch "to save money, it's as simple as that."
The Christiansburg plant currently pays out-of-town rates to Blacksburg, which are 75 percent higher than Blacksburg charges its in-town customers.
Blacksburg Town Manager Ron Secrist said the town received $15,426 from Corning over the past year for water. The actual cost of the water was $5,570, and the remaining money was profit, he said.
John Lemley, Christiansburg town manager, said Corning would save roughly $7,000 to $8,000 annually by paying current in-town rates to Christiansburg.
Both town councils must approve the transfer. Blacksburg has scheduled a public hearing on the sale for June 12.
Lemley said the plant will not be closed during the transfer.
"It's a paper transaction. They stop reading the meter and we start reading it."
Both towns and Virginia Tech are served by the Blacksburg, Christiansburg & VPI Water Authority.
Lemley said the Corning plant uses an average of 20,000 gallons a day in manufacturing parts for catalytic converters.
The transfer of water service is a logistical leftover from Christiansburg's 1985 annexation in Montgomery County, he said. The annexed area included 47 Blacksburg water customers, including the Corning plant.
Christiansburg paid Blacksburg about $45,000 last year for the rights to serve 46 of the users. But Corning was not at full production and Blacksburg could not assess how much the factory's water service was worth.
"Our water bills were peanuts till just the last few months," Hoover said. Also, the plant recently switched from a drainage field to Christiansburg's sewer lines, and Hoover said combing both services would make billing easier.
Secrist said the $65,544 which Blacksburg is asking reflects 10 years of revenue at the present rate.
by CNB