LAFAYETTE, La. (KLFY)– When you drive on Walker Road, you may have noticed some construction for LUS’s new water distribution center.

Heidi Tweedel, the business & marketing analyst for LUS, said the new building is just down the road from the existing administration building. The contract for the project was awarded in June 2022, and construction was approved to begin the next month, July 2022. 

Tweedel said every year, they allocate money to different projects that LUS is doing. 

According to LUS Director Jeff Stewart, the project cost was somewhere around $2 million, plus $450,000 to purchase the property. This was publicly bid, and it involved a drainage component as not negatively to impact the neighbors.

“The new building will be sort of a headquarters for our water distribution division,” Tweedel said. “This new space will allow office personnel and field personnel to be in one building together. Right now, they’re in two separate buildings right here in our main location. That in itself will allow for increased sufficiency division just so that they do not have to go back and forth between two buildings. It will be all together under one roof.” 

In addition, the new center will be a large space, which will allow for more equipment, and that in itself will better equip the field personnel to be able to keep up with the demand of repairing and maintaining our water system. 

“It’s going to be a bigger space to allow for more equipment to help the guys going out in the fields to keep up with the demands for repairing and maintaining the water system,” Tweedel said. “I was told that we do have a number of work orders that are not completed yet, so that in itself would just allow for more work orders to be completed and better help the water system for our customers.”

LUS already has a water distribution office at the administration building, but it is shared with the wasted water division.

“It’s been in the process for a little over a year now, so just having one more project crossed off our list and some of that is going to really benefit the city of Lafayette and its residents,” Tweedel said. “It’s really great.”

The project is scheduled to be completed on Nov. 1.