Milton begins planning for new public works building

Milton officials are set to begin planning a project that has long been on the town’s mind: a new public works building.

While costs and what the building might look like are still to be determined, the town is planning to construct the new facility on a parcel the town controls on Sam Lucas Road. 

Town Manager Kristy Rogers said there is no timetable for construction, and the town is only at the planning stage. 

Mayor Ted Kanakos said, “It’s really premature right now. It’s worthwhile. We always thought we’d like to have a new public works building.”

The town came into the land in 2018 when Loblolly LLC gave the town 10 acres on an 80-acre tract of farmland it owns there. The original deal was that five of those 10 acres would be used for a new wastewater treatment plant and the other five would be given to the town for a then-unspecified use. But since then, Artesian Wastewater has purchased Tidewater Utilities, the town’s wastewater provider since 2007, and is planning to build a new plant at its Sussex Regional Recharge Facility on Route 30. Artesian has expressed its intent to pump Milton’s wastewater to that plant. As part of a negotiated settlement with Artesian related to that Tidewater purchase, the land originally slated for Tidewater’s plant will revert back to the town, and Artesian will provide sewer service to the new public works building free of charge.

The idea of a new public works facility at the Sam Lucas Road site has been bandied about by town officials fairly recently. The current facility is located at 210 Front St., and the Front Street parcel is also the proposed location of a new cellphone tower that Verizon would construct.