Nearly eight years have passed since the first emails were sent between leaders at Have Faith Community Development Corporation and Manning city officials about providing water and wastewater service to the community on U.S. 521 in Alcolu.
The non-profit ministry joined city officials and various representatives from the U.S. Department of Agriculture on Thursday at The Lighthouse in Alcolu to celebrate the culmination of those efforts with a groundbreaking ceremony.
“We are not here to do this for ourselves, but it is a work for the people,” said U.S. Department of Agriculture Director of Rural Development for South Carolina Vernita Dore. “Everyone deserves decent, safe, potable water. Everybody deserves a sanitary system that works.”
The Alcolu Water, Sewer and Stormwater Extension project began with those first few emails in late 2006 between the Rev. Dwayne Johnson, executive director for Have Faith CDC, and USDA engineers. Have Faith founded the Mother Geneva Johnson Academy, a school for orphaned kids in the old Georgia Pacific building on U.S. 521, in 2008. Johnson said he always envisioned an “entire complex near Alcolu,” which would include the Lighthouse, restaurants and a planned residential care facility.
It was the residential care facility that sparked the faith-based initiative’s interest in the extension project.
“We thank God today for getting us to this point,” Johnson said. “This is something that is going to just serve God’s purpose, and it will let us work his will even further in the community.”
Manning Mayor Julia Nelson said numerous city officials worked on the project, including two mayors – herself and former mayor Sen. Kevin Johnson – and three city administrators – incumbent Scott Tanner and Patrick Goodwin and Rebecca Rhodes.
Nelson said she hopes the extension will provide the infrastructure needed to match the Sumter side of U.S. 521 and its burgeoning area around Continental Tire.
“That wasn’t an investment that took place just a few years ago,” Nelson said. “The people in Sumter had to plan for that many, many years ago. Even though some people may not be able to connect the dots with what we are doing here in Alcolu, we are expanding Manning with this project. We are bringing hope to Clarendon County.”
“We are going to have the infrastructure in place for those big dreams to become a reality,” Nelson added.
She and Johnson thanked Manning Public Works Director L. Rubin Hardy for his work on the project.
“Anytime we’ve needed anything from him, Rubin tells us ‘I’ve got this,’” Johnson said. “He has truly been sent from God to help us in this task.”
Tanner said that construction will likely start in July, and will result in 1,800 feet of water mains; 3,000 feet of gravity sewer lines; 1,100 feet of storm drains; 2,000 feet of sewer force mains; and a retention pond for continued development.
USDA funding will be provided through a “long-term, low-interest Rural Utility Service Loan,” along with a Rural Business Enterprise Grant, Tanner said.
“Whether you wrote a letter, whether you came from Washington or Columbia to visit, whether you did all the work back at the office, we all have a part in this great work,” Dore said Thursday. “This work … (is) not (for) people who are here today but for the people who will come after this.”
