City of Strafford holds second public input meeting on controversial wastewater plant proposal

STRAFFORD, Mo. — Residents of Strafford are continuing to voice concerns over a proposed wastewater plant that could affect drinking water.

The City of Strafford held another public meeting at City Hall to discuss the proposed sewage facility, which would discharge into Davis Creek, a tributary of the James River, which provides water to over 111,000 customers in Greene County.

An issue continually raised by the community is the potential for 'forever chemicals' to leak downstream into Lake Springfield, which could harm the area's drinking water quality.

Trevor Osorno, a senior hydrogeologist at Ozark Underground Lab, emphasized the need for more research into the potential consequences of the project, pointing out that the plan has not adequately addressed possible contaminants such as microplastics.

"This has a potential to appreciably impact the drinking water quality coming into the Springfield treatment plant," Osorno said. "No characterization has been made using field data to understand the risks and potentially adverse outcomes to discharge of effluent in that losing stream segment."

Another recurring argument is that the proposed facility is unnecessary, as the city already has an existing connection to Springfield's wastewater plant.

Michael Stelzer from the Save Davis Creek Initiative noted the growing community movement against the plant, with nearly 500 members across both Strafford and Springfield.

Boden Hammer, who spoke at the podium, recommends halting progress on the wastewater plant plan, stating that the city should "hit the pause button."

Stelzer expressed gratitude to the city for continuing to hold public input meetings, allowing residents to voice their concerns.

The city plans to gather feedback from these town halls to determine the next steps.

All facts in this report were gathered by journalists employed by OzarksFirst.com. Artificial intelligence tools were used to reformat from a broadcast script into a news article for our website. This report was edited and fact-checked by OzarksFirst.com staff before being published.