Getting your Trinity Audio player ready...

WINTON – As part of the federal government’s assistance in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, local government entities across the nation received American Rescue Plan (ARP) funding.

Hertford County will use just a small portion of their $3.5 million to “rescue” a local resident.

At their regularly scheduled meeting here Sept. 6, the county’s Board of Commissioners voted in favor of a proposal to spend up to $10,000 of ARP funds to assist a homeowner in installing a new well.

County Manager David Cotton told the commissioners that a homeowner on Rea Road, located off Union Road, is experiencing a failing well. That elderly homeowner, he said, lives alone and has “limited financial resources.”

“That is the only house on Rea Road. We had our Public Works Department develop a cost estimate to extend a waterline from the nearest point in the county’s rural water system, which was over one mile away, and that cost would be $400,000.”

Cotton added the average cost to drill a new well ranges from $17,000 to $20,000.

“The homeowner has secured a $10,000 grant through the USDA,” Cotton noted. “Currently, community members are actively seeking to raise additional funds to install the well. As of August 29, that effort has raised $3,500.”

That leaves a balance of $3,500 to $10,000, depending on the total cost to dig a new well.

“I believe we should assist in that with American Rescue Plan dollars,” said Commission Chairman Ronald Gatling. “This is what these rescue dollars are meant to do.”

A motion to use ARP funds to help the homeowner was approved without objection.