Plans for a new main office bulding for the Pearl River Valley Water Supply District took a step ahead with the Legislature providing some funding.
The Legislature appropriated $2 million for the district to apply toward constructing an office that will be located at Bobby Cleveland Park at Lakeshore, 1112 Northshore Parkway.
The new building will cost about $8 million and, as it stands now, the remaining $6 million will come from the district’s general fund, said John Sigman, general manager of the district.
The district plans to seek additional funding for the new office from the Legislature during the 2025 session, he said.
The district currently occupies a building at 115 Madison Landing Circle in Ridgeland that houses 50 employees. The district employs about 110 people with 60 of them having positions in maintenance.
“The current office is 75 or 80 years old and was a farmhouse before the Barnett Reservoir was conceived,” he said. “It’s in bad shape. We’ve had animals living in the attic.”
Wier Boerner Allin Architecture is designing the new office that will contain about 15,000 square feet compared to 12,000 in the current office. Two additional architecture firms were interviewed, and Wier Boerner fit with the district’s vision, Sigman said.
Plans call for the exterior of the new office to blend with the recreational features at Bobby Cleveland Park, perhaps using wood and stone, he said.
“We hope to have it under construction by the end of the year,” Sigman said. “It will take a year to a year and a half to build.”
The property where the current office sits is zoned commercial, Sigman said, and will be available for a developer to lease after the building is demolished.
“Location, location, location” makes the property desirable, he said. “We’ve had a good bit of interest in it.”
The Pearl River Valley Water Supply District is the state agency responsible for managing the 33,000-acre Barnett Reservoir and the 17,000 acres surrounding the lake, 12,000 of which are forest land.
