County colonias, Marfa-area projects under review by water board

Incomplete audit also results in inability to apply for $15 million in funding until next year

PRESIDIO COUNTY — Several projects previously approved for new water infrastructure grants in Marfa and the county’s colonias are now under review by the Texas Water Development Board (TWDB) to ensure they are still eligible for funding, according to a spokesperson for the board. The news — which puts some of the projects in limbo — came with word of another blow from a different TWDB funding source: Presidio County will have to wait until the next funding cycle early next year to apply for $15 million in new water grants because it hasn’t completed its 2023 financial audit.

The TWDB’s Economically Distressed Areas Program (EDAP), intended to fund water and wastewater infrastructure in areas without service, has added “new hoops” to go through to get money for an approved grant that could leave some projects on the chopping block, according to Trey Gerfers, general manager of the Presidio County Underground Water Conservation District, who helps coordinate the grant program locally.

The Presidio County Water Infrastructure Steering Committee initially sought $12.6 million in loans and grants from the EDAP program after holding numerous committee meetings to pinpoint the county’s high-priority projects — which include new water/wastewater systems in Las Pampas and Shafter, a new wastewater system for the Fort D.A. Russell area and first-time services for the East Heights area and other pockets in Marfa. Although the projects were pre-approved for $12.6 million, the TWDB scaled down the funding to $4.6 million (including $3.2 million in grants and $1.4 million in loans) after it said it would only fund planning of the projects, not the actual construction, Gerfers said. 

The other reason for the reduction was a Texas attorney general’s office assessment that the county needed a county-wide utility board, which was a requirement to administer the grants. The county subsequently formed a Systems Utility Board last January to fulfill the requirement for the remaining grant funds.

Now, the TWDB is stating that it will only fund areas if they have actual residences — the preference being contiguous houses or apartments that would form the basis for new water/wastewater lines, Gerfers said. That runs counter to what the county originally thought was the main goal of the program, helping communities with drastically needed water projects, he said.

“We are essentially still litigating eligibility for what we believed we had already complied with for each project,” Gerfers said. “We told them what we were going to do, and now it feels like they’re moving the goal posts.”

A spokesperson for the TWDB, Emma Rogers, wrote in an email statement, “The EDAP has very specific eligibility requirements and EDAP funds may only be used to serve existing residences.” 

“The first step for all EDAP projects is to complete the planning phase [including] the eligibility assessment, which is a detailed evaluation of the water or sewer inadequacy (e.g., lack of water service), documenting the financial eligibility of each EDAP area, and documenting the number of existing EDAP-eligible residences and population in each project area as well as the ineligible areas,” the statement said. 

Rogers said that while an initial eligibility determination was made with the grant application, “the Facility Engineering Plan provides a more detailed evaluation conducted by the funding recipient and their consultants to clearly define the EDAP-eligible project areas and existing residences.” Gerfers said TWDB never notified him of a forthcoming engineering plan until September.

Gerfers laid out what might happen in each project area. In Las Pampas, for example, the spread-out houses might lead the TWDB to reject portions of the project. Shafter, on the other hand, has more of a town-center community and a line of residences south of Cibolo Creek and through Upper Shafter Road that would seem to make sense for the board’s requirements, he said.

The west end of the East Heights of Marfa forms another challenge with little contiguous housing. Even if the TWDB approves planning for infrastructure — still focused on contiguous residential — it could result in truncated lines that don’t make good engineering sense, Gerfers said. “The water development board is not set up to deal with rural realities,” he said. He added that the TWDB is much more comfortable working with bigger utilities and cities. He outlined his frustrations with the board in his “Our Water Matters” column in this issue of The Big Bend Sentinel and described the board as being unwilling or unable to assist Presidio County and communicate timely with local officials to ensure the requirements. 

The TWDB rejected Gerfers’ assertion. “To help ensure a successful project, the TWDB staff have been working with the project representatives to communicate program requirements, respond to questions, provide guidance, and to review and approve project submittals, including requests to release funds to cover costs associated with completing required planning phase documents,” Rogers wrote. “The planning phase of the project is scheduled to be complete in spring 2025.”

Delayed for an additional state funding pool

While wrestling with additional reviews with TDWB on the EDAP grants, local officials realized that an important deadline was approaching — having a 2023 county audit completed by December to meet requirements to apply for TWDB State Revolving Funds totaling $15 million for water projects.

Alicia Sanchez, who was appointed as the county auditor after serving five years in the office as an assistant, said she was aware of the requirement, but a lack of office staff and resources made meeting the deadline for the audit — which usually takes at least a year to complete —  impossible. “It’s myself and one other assistant, and unfortunately sometimes you have to leave things on the back burner so you can take on other stuff that takes precedence over the audit,” Sanchez said. The auditor said she’d like to have more help in her office to keep the audits on track, but understands the county doesn’t have the money to do that.

Gerfers said the auditor was burdened by work from other departments and he fully understands the constraints Sanchez was under.

On November 25, the County Commissioners Court accepted a $5,000 grant from the Water Finance Exchange — a nonprofit helping with the county’s water projects — to hire assistance in accounting for specific tasks, Sanchez said. But she added that even if that help had come sooner, her office still wouldn’t have completed the audit in time to be eligible for the water funding.