Lexington council picks site for controversial pump station after months of debate
After months of debate, the Lexington council voted earlier this week to replace a sewer pump station at its current location near Dunbar High School.
The Lexington-Fayette Urban County Council had asked the city to consider a site outside the current urban service boundary on historic Mill Ridge Farm on Bowman Mill Road.
A $160,000 engineering study showed the current location on Mint Lane would cost $5.0 million less than the Mill Ridge Farm site. Pump stations move sewage and wastewater to the city’s two treatment plants.
The rehabilitation of Mint Lane pump station will cost approximately $19.6 million. Estimates to move the pump downstream to the farm, owned by Headley and Price Bell, would be $24.9 million. A third option to put the pump on land near the Blue GrassAirport was nixed at an April 14 council work session. That option would cost $48.4 million.
During a Tuesday work session, the council voted 10-5 to keep the pump at the current location following extended debate and comments from some in the agricultural community to keep the pump station at the current location.
Moving the pump station outside the urban service boundary would help Mill Ridge Farm develop its property in the future, some argued. Moreover, the Mill Ridge Farm site would not require developers of a new expansion area off of Parkers Mill, which was added in 2023 expansion, to put in a pump station, those opposed to the Bowman Mill location told the council.
“If you approve this at taxpayers expense, you will reduce the sewer infrastructure costs for the Bells,” said John Phillips, who served on a committee to determine what land should be added to the urban service boundary in 2023. “It represents a private benefit at the public expense. It’s a benefit all developers will seek.”
Price Bell, one of the owners of Mill Ridge Farm, urged the council to reconsider the Bowman Mill Road location because the engineering study also showed several issues with the Mint Lane site, which could drive up costs. Moreover, the Bells went to do a wetland mitigation on their property near the pump station. State officials have said a $2 million grant for that project would be in jeopardy if the pump station is not moved down stream to the Mill Ridge Farm location.
“The Dunbar site is all risk and no reward,” Bell said of the cost estimates. Bell said if the family wanted to add land to the expansion area it would have to go through a new process, which was approved by the council in February.
“This is an infrastructure decision not an expansion decision,” Bell said.
How a fight over a pump station turned into fight over expansion
The fight over the pump station started in August when the council took the unusual step of asking Acting Environmental and Public Works Commissioner Charlie Martin to look at other locations including Bowman Mill for the pump station.
The August request came two months after the Bell family hosted a design open house in June 2025 to give people a preview of a proposed upscale development on a section of Mill Ridge Farm, prompting questions from many in the agricultural community about the timing of the request to explore alternative sites for the pump station. Mill Ridge Farm had lobbied to be included in the 2023 expansion but was ultimately excluded.
The pump station has to be replaced as part of the city’s 2011 U.S. Environmental Protection Agency consent decree to improve and upgrade its stormwater and sewer systems. The pump has frequent overflows, and noxious odors from the station is a persistent complaint from neighbors, Martin has previously said.
The city is in a time crunch to get the remaining 10 projects from that 2011 court settlement completed by 2030. Martin said he bumped two other projects ahead of the Mint Lane project after the council hit pause and wanted exploration of different sites.
Martin said during Tuesday’s work session the city will have enough time to complete the project by the 2030 deadline.
Questions raised about cost, odors and site issues
Some council members said they were concerned protracted legal negotiations with Fayette County Public Schools, which owns the site where the rehabilitated pump station would go, could drive up costs or slow the timeline of the projects.
Martin said he was confident the city and the school system could work something out. The cost of the land will be determined by an appraisal, but an estimate of those costs was included in the $19.6 million price tag.
Council member Liz Sheehan said she was also concerned about the loss of the $2 million state grant for wetland mitigation on the Bell property.
“Does the city have money it could use for (wetland mitigation)?” Sheehan asked.
Martin said there is some city money for stormwater projects, but that money is limited and would not be able to cover a $2 million wetland mitigation.
Council member David Sevigny contacted Dunbar High School officials, who raised concerns about odor and placing a wet weather storage tank on the property.
Martin said the new wet weather storage tank, which holds water during major rain events and helps stop sanitary sewer overflows, will be inset into the ground and will not tower over Dunbar. The site is less-than-ideal because of its proximity to Dunbar’s baseball field, he said. If the city moves it further away from the high school, the pump station will be outside the urban service or growth boundary. The new pump station will have treatments to treat the odor problems, Martin said. The current pump station has no odor control technology.
Sevigny said because the Mint Lane location is a more difficult site, it’s likely that contingency built into the $19.6 million estimate will be exhausted. Moreover, the Bells may donate the land if it was moved to the Mill Ridge Farm.
“I don’t think the two proposals are actually far off,” Sevigny said.
Mayor Linda Gorton encouraged the council to vote for the current location, arguing it was more fiscally responsible to keep the pump station at its current location for the much-lower cost of $19.6 million.
“Mint Lane will allow us to address the odor, the flooding problems and it meets the consent decree requirements,” Gorton said.
Martin told the council he would return to the council if the Dunbar site proves problematic and more costly than the engineering report anticipated.
Council members who voted against placing the pump at Dunbar: Sevigny, Sheehan, Vice Mayor Dan Wu, Amy Beasley, Shayla Lynch. Those who voted in favor: Hil Boone, Tom Eblen, Joseph Hale, James Brown, Tyler Morton, Emma Curtis, Chuck Ellinger III, Whitney Elliott Baxter, Lisa Higgins-Hord, Jennifer Reynolds.
