Liberty County Development Authority members and staff are encouraged by the feedback from their most recent meeting about their wastewater treatment plant proposals.

The LCDA held a meeting in June to discuss the potential for a wastewater treatment discharge into the Laurel View River and met with Riceboro residents earlier this month to discuss a discharge into the North Newport River.

“We are very excited where we are as we move toward our water reclamation facility,” said state Rep. Al Williams, the LCDA board chairman. “We hear a lot of positive things. The negative things get all the headlines. We strive to be as transparent as we can. We have an open door policy. There is no secrecy here.”

The LCDA and the Ogeechee Riverkeeper, as a result of those meetings, entered into an agreement for water quality monitoring in both the Laurel View and North Newport rivers.

“I feel proud of our effort in that we have listened and it has shaped some of the things we have done, like the water education series, and like the agreement with the Ogeechee Riverkeeper,” LCDA CEO Brynn Grant said.

Williams said he was glad the authority had a place to accommodate the nearly 200 people who showed up at the Riceboro Youth Center to listen and ask questions about the LCDA’s plans for a water treatment plant.

“I’ve had a whole lot of discussions with a whole lot of people and the people of Riceboro have a better understanding of what we’re trying to do,” he said. “It was a very positive outcome,” added LCDA board member Willa Lewis.

LCDA members also discussed financing the wastewater treatment plant, which could treat up to 3 million gallons per day, and what the worstcase scenario would be.

“The worst-case scenario is not doing the project and not having sewer capacity for job and community growth,” said Tony Rojas, principal at TPR Consulting and former executive director of the Macon Water Authority.

A workshop on becoming a certified water steward turned out to be such a hot ticket, the Liberty County Development Authority is scheduling another series of meetings.

The inaugural water stewards certification program, in conjunction with Georgia Southern University’s Institute for Water and Health, starts Saturday, with successive meetings each Saturday from August 15–29. Each session last two hours and the program is set up to help Liberty County residents better understand the county’s water resources and coastal environment.

That class reached its limit of 24 and the LCDA will start a second workshop, to run on Wednesdays, and are aiming for a late January and early February run. “We’re excited so many people were eager to learn how our water works,” Grant said.

Joey Brown, the retired Liberty County administrator now working with the LCDA as a consultant on several issues, said the contracts for roadwork into Tradeport West have been executed and Sikes Construction is expected to be on site no later than August 10.

A $2 million OneGeorgia Rural Site Development Initiative grant is expected to fund 7,000 feet of access road into the tract. There is a local match required, Brown said, and because it is a grant-funded project, having closer supervision from engineers Thomas and Hutton on the work has been ironed out.

Brown also told LCDA members that Atlantic Building Components is working on the last hurdles to its construction process. Atlantic Building Components is setting up shop on Technology Drive, where it will build a truss manufacturing facility, employing 25– 30 people.

“They are anxious to get started,” Brown said.

Brown said the state Department of Transportation has asked the MidCoast Regional Airport’s joint management board to address lighting on its five-year capital improvement plan. The board still will work on an expansion of the leased area, and there is expected to be state and federal funding for lighting improvements, with 90% of it coming from the Federal Aviation Administration and 5% from the state DOT. The local partnership will have to fund the remaining 5%. The lighting project will be in the state’s fiscal year 2028 budget, and Brown said there is special local option sales tax money available for the local share.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture also has reached out to MidCoast about housing four to five helicopters at the airport and could fund building the hangar for those, Brown added.