Poultry plant closure hits Charles City water budgets

By Travis Fischer, tkfischer@charlescitypress.com

It’s budget-setting season for the Charles City Council, which sat down with water and wastewater staff to review last year’s activities and plan for fiscal year 2026.

The council first met with Wastewater Superintendent Dan Rimrod, who presented the council with his department budget notes for the upcoming fiscal year.

A priority for the city this year will be identifying and addressing points of infiltration in the city’s sewer system, with the department asking for $200,000 for slip lining and smoke testing.

The city is also working on identifying lead-based service lines and is hoping that a partnership with the Environmental Protection Agency may provide funding for their removal and replacement.

Reviewing last year’s activity, it was noted that the Water Resource Recovery Facility project has been closed out.

“Thankfully we did the wastewater project when we did,” said City Administrator Steve Diers, noting that the recently completed $20 million project could have cost between $30-35 million if done today.

On another recently completed project, Water Superintendent Cory Spieker reported that the Clearwell project is already making a noticeable improvement to the efficiency of the water treatment plant.

“We’re definitely seeing a difference,” said Spieker.

A complication for the water budget this year comes from the unexpected closure of the Pure Prairie Poultry plant. With the plant shutting down operations, expected revenue for the waste water and water departments will be down about $600,000 each.

“It was going fine until it didn’t,” said City Administrator Steve Diers.

While a 3.5% increase in water rates has already been figured into projected revenues, the closure of the poultry plant may necessitate a further increase.