OXFORD — Only 22 customers support the $28.5 million wastewater treatment plant and local officials say they need more customers.

To that end, the Board of Selectmen has called a public informational meeting for 6 p.m. Wednesday, June 14, to remind residents and businesses owners about Oxford’s sewer connection incentive program. The meeting will held at the Town Office at 85 Pleasant St.

But before that, voters at the annual town meeting Saturday, June 10, will be asked to raise and appropriate $1.27 million for the wastewater treatment account.

“The bond to finance (the treatment plant) has to be paid back,” interim Town Manager Becky Lippincott said.

The state’s first ultraviolet light wastewater treatment system is beside Route 121 in Welchville village.

The lack of users and existing TIF money is not enough to pay back the bond, nor is it enough to keep the gravity-fed system operating properly, Lippincott said. Effluent is now being shipped in from out of town to support the plant operation, she said.

At the June 14 meeting, residents will learn how the sewer connection incentive program works, including hiring a contractor, connection costs and loan programs.

The program was developed to help eliminate water quality and service problems from failing septic systems, but many homeowners balked at the opportunity, saying there was no need to tie into the public system as long as their system worked properly.

Selectmen said last year that the hookup costs would probably range between $500 and $5,000, based on variables ranging from topography to electrical service and distance from the street.

As an incentive, voters last year approved transferring $250,000 from town funds to provide $500 subsidies for hookups through a revolving loan fund managed by selectmen.

Approval of that and several other articles also allowed a portion of the loans from a revolving loan fund program to be forgiven as an incentive to hook into the system and to facilitate repayment of the $250,000 to the Reserve Fund over 10 years.

The town is now also hoping to extend the sewer lines to Pleasant Street to tie in Oxford Elementary School.

ldixon@sunmediagroup.net

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