Daviess County Water District merger nearing completion

December 7, 2020 | 12:10 am

Updated December 6, 2020 | 8:48 pm

Photo from Daviess County Fiscal Court

A merger is expected to be complete by as early as Jan. 1 that will combine the Southeast and West districts of Daviess County Water. Officials said customers and staff will be unaffected, as the move is designed to simply streamline operations and eliminate duplicate processes.

Once the merger is complete, the utility will be known as Daviess County Water District.

“We’re just trying to basically enable the combined system to be managed, operated and maintained more effectively as one rather than a duplication of services and duties,” said General Manager Billy Higdon.

Officials have talked about a merger for a few years, and the official process began 2018. Higdon is hopeful all the resolutions and other paperwork will be finalized by the end of the year.

Part of the merger requires the land currently serviced by the West District to be annexed by the Southeast District. The West District serves about 5,500 customers, while the Southeast serves about 7,500. 

Customers and their service will not be affected. Though operations will be streamlined with a merger, Higdon said staffing will also be unaffected.

“We’ve always operated with the same employees from the same office,” he said. “This just kind of streamlines things to where we don’t have to separate payments, we don’t have to operate with two sets of books, two audits, and on and on. Everything was kind of redundant. We’re just trying to streamline this and make it more cost-effective.”

Higdon said with everyone operating from the same building at 3400 Bittel Road and neither District having any debt, the merger is about as simple as it could be.

“It’s a simple merge … neither has to buy and pay out the other,” he said. “They both have reserves. We’ll just combine assets.”

Both Water District boards unanimously agreed that it will be in the best interest of their district as well as their customers to merge.

A petition signed by Southeast District Board Chairman Christina O’Bryan was submitted to Judge-Executive Al Mattingly on Oct. 20. It explained that the district entered a merger agreement on Aug. 18, and it requested Mattingly enter an executive order annexing the current West District service area to the Southeast District.

On Nov. 2, the West District Board submitted a letter, signed by chairman Scott Kuegel, showing support for the petition and requesting the order be granted. 

According to the letter, the West District “determined that it is economically feasible, desirable, beneficial, and in the best interests of the general public for West District to be merged into Southeast District.”

December 7, 2020 | 12:10 am

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