The Sedona City Council unanimously approved a $593,920 cooperative purchasing agreement with Kear Civil Corporation of Phoenix to replace approximately 1,250 feet of sewer mains along Northview Road during their May 13 meeting.

“This line is problematic. It has a lot of sags in it. It gets a lot of grease buildup, which has resulted in a couple of sanitary sewer overflows in the area,” Wastewater Director Roxane Holland told the council. “We’re actually cleaning it on a monthly basis now, which is excessive. It’s normally about a five-year rotation for a properly working sewer line.”

Holland said the project would replace about 400 feet of six-inch sewer line and additionally upgrade about 850 feet of four-inch pipe to eight-inch pipe. The existing line predates Sedona’s incorporation and was taken over by the city as part of the consent decree imposed on the newly-incorporated Sedona in 1988 by the Arizona Department of Environmental Quality requiring it to construct a central sewer system.

City staff recommended the contract be awarded to Kear under a linking agreement rather than a competitive procurement process.

“We chose Kear based on their previous performance with other contracts with us, and they also have construction crews in the area, which we felt would be efficient,” Holland said.

The line replacement was originally budgeted at $350,000; Holland said that due to the 70% increase in the amount of the contract, the project would be funded in part from funds budgeted for next year’s line rehabilitation. She did not specify start or completion dates for the work.