Cleveland County Water builds $5 million operations center

Rebecca Sitzes, The Shelby Star
·2 min read

Cleveland County water will soon have a more centrally located customer service and operations facility.

Construction on a new building is underway on Polkville road and is expected to be completed some time next year.

Brad Cornwell, general manager, said a more centrally located office has been in the works for several years.

“About seven years ago we did a customer survey. One of the highest things that came out of the customer survey was how big Cleveland County is and how big our water system is and that we did not have a centrally located office center for folks to do business,” Cornwell said. “It’s five minutes for a few people and 30 minutes for a lot of people.”

He said they also considered emergency response times and maintenance.

The land was purchased sometime around 2018 and site work began in June.

Boomerang Architects completed the design and Beam Construction is the contractor.

“It's financed with a $4.9 million USDA loan,” Cornwell said.

He said it is a 40 year loan.

“It will have customer service, billing, the whole nine yards and maintenance all in one building,” he said.

Currently, maintenance operates out of a separate building and Cornwell said the office, which was built in 1993, has outgrown its space with some staff members working in the basement.

They plan to keep a kiosk in the current office located on Casar-Lawndale Road.

Cleveland County Water also owns 70 acres on the Broad River near Boiling Springs and Cornwell said someday, they plan to build an additional water plant.

“Our office will be centrally located to that as well,” he said. “That's another thing we took into account.”

The construction contract is a one-year contract but metal delays will most likely extend that timeframe.

So far, site work and some curb and gutters have been completed while they wait for the steel infrastructure to construct the building’s concrete pad.

This article originally appeared on The Shelby Star: Cleveland County Water builds more centrally located operations center