VIDALIA — After a years-long process to procure funding, the Concordia Parish Police Jury awarded a bid to replace the Washington Heights Subdivision sewage system in Ferriday during the jury’s regularly scheduled meeting Monday evening.

The existing sewer had been abandoned in the early 1990s after its previous owner declared bankruptcy, leaving residents there with untreated sewage in a system that has endured decades of neglect, said Sandi Burley, Concordia Parish Police Jury secretary and treasurer.

The land and sewage pond were later donated to the police jury by previous owners, Burley said.

The jury received a little more than $400,000 from a Louisiana Community Development Block Grant in April 2018 to replace the system. However bids for the project were in excess of $500,000 even after redesigning and requesting new bids three times over, Burley said.

In April, the jury sought an additional grant to supplement the overage in the bids and received approval for $150,000 from the Delta Regional Authority last week, Burley said.

During Monday’s meeting, the jury awarded the project to JABAR Inc. for $407,012.30 and could break ground as soon as they receive legislative approval from the state, said District 5A juror Jimmy Jernigan.

Once started, the sewage system could be completed in approximately five to six months, Burley said.

Jernigan said he was overjoyed to learn that his constituents in Washington Heights Subdivision would finally have the relief they needed.

“We bidded this project out two or three times. … This will finally give us enough money to go ahead and do it,” Jernigan said of the grant. “It’s been about a three-year project, and when you are working with the state, sometimes people just don’t understand how long it takes to do something like that. … Most of the people who live there are on a fixed income, are up in age or are disabled and wouldn’t have been able to repair it themselves.”

Jernigan thanked Burley and Washington Heights residents for being heavily involved with procuring the funds, adding a few of them have written to state legislators and even drove to Baton Rouge asking for help.

“It’s just such a blessing that we finally have the money and can start this project and get it done, because these people need it,” Jernigan said.