An agreement approved last week by the Bulloch County Board of Education stands to make the county school system the largest single customer for the city of Brooklet's new sewer system, and also a leading customer for expanding its water system.

Under the terms of the agreement, the school district will be responsible for the design and installation of a sewer lift station, or pumping station, at an estimated cost of $500,000, plus the installation of a 300,000-gallon water tank on school district property at an estimated cost of $2.2 million. The Brooklet city government, meanwhile, will pay for about $90,000 in engineering fees associated with the water tank, $150,000 for the water main pipeline extension and, for an estimated cost of approximately $1.2 million, the design and installation of the sewer force-main pipeline.

On the other hand, the city of Brooklet will waive any regular tap or aid-in-construction fees it might otherwise charge for connections to the schools, at an anticipated savings to the school district — stated in the agreement — of $715,000.

However, the school district will pay aid-in-construction fees directly to the city of Statesboro, estimated at $525,000, that Statesboro would otherwise charge to Brooklet for the added capacity needed to serve the schools in pass-through to Statesboro's wastewater treatment plant.

This cost-sharing arrangement is intended not only to connect the new schools to the sewer system but also to expand the water system's firefighting capacity for the schools and surrounding area, Brooklet Mayor Nicky Gwinnett confirmed in a phone interview Monday.

"That's kind of where we ended up is about an even split between everybody, and it provides a much-needed water tank for the town," he said.

Sewer progress

After years of planning and figuring out how to fund it, Brooklet officials broke ground in January 2025 for the $6 million Phase I of the first real municipal sewer system in Bulloch County's second-largest town. The Brooklet-owned force-main from downtown Brooklet to an existing Statesboro-owned line that leads to Statesboro's treatment plant is now nearing completion, for testing to begin in perhaps four or five weeks, Gwinnett said. 

A third 'SEB' school

Meanwhile, the county school district's plan for dealing with population growth has centered since early 2021 on construction of a new Southeast Bulloch High School, currently planned for just over 2,000 students but expandable for up to 2,500. The 89-acre site, purchased in spring 2022, abuts the current Southeast Bulloch Middle School campus, which is next to the current Southeast Bulloch High.

Construction of the new high school is slated to begin this year, but with the school not expected to open for two to three more years.

Also as part of the school district's plan, the current high school will be repurposed as the new middle school and the current middle school will become Southeast Bulloch Upper Elementary School, for fourth and fifth grades.

Two years of talks

Off and on again for at least two years, school system and Brooklet city officials have discussed connecting all three Southeast Bulloch schools to Brooklet's planned sewer system. Board of Education members had discussed a proposed agreement during a couple of recent work sessions. But there was no further public discussion during the regular board meeting last Thursday evening, Feb. 12. 

After a closed session — announced as closed to the public for discussion of personnel actions and pending or potential litigation — the board voted in open session on Superintendent Charles Wilson's recommendations for contract renewals, mostly for teachers, and other personnel actions, including the hiring of some principals.

Then the board acted, without comment, on Wilson's recommendation to approve the intergovernmental agreement with the city of Brooklet. On a motion by District 3 board member Jennifer Mock, seconded by District 1 board member Lannie Lanier, the board voted 8-0 to approve the agreement just before adjourning the meeting.

The Statesboro Herald obtained a copy of the pending agreement Friday from Marc Bruce, lead attorney for the Board of Education.

Brooklet City Attorney Ben Perkins "has indicated to us that the text that we passed last night would be acceptable to the mayor and City Council as well, but we won't know that conclusively until they actually vote on it," Bruce said Friday.

Brooklet City Clerk Lori Phillips, since January also serving as interim city manager, sent out copies of the agenda Monday for the 7 p.m. Thursday, Feb. 19, regular Brooklet City Council meeting. The intergovernmental agreement with the Bulloch County School District, and a motion to approve, is listed as the second "discussion" item, after Brooklet's new, independent Comprehensive Plan.

Mayor Gwinnett seldom predicts what the council will do but said he's "99 percent" certain the agreement with the school district will be approved.

"You know, this process has been going on for two years, so I think we've looked at it every which way possible," he said.

100,000 gpd

A comparison between the pending new agreement and a separate intergovernmental agreement the two cities made in 2023 for Brooklet to connect and send its wastewater to the Statesboro treatment plant suggests what a large share of the total capacity the schools could use.

Under the 2023 agreement, Brooklet was to pay Statesboro a one-time $160,000 "aid to construction fee" for the first 100,000 gallons-per-day capacity. Beginning in the future when Brooklet's sewer flow exceeded 100,000 gallons per day, Brooklet would then pay Statesboro a new one-time aid to construction fee of $640,000 for an additional 200,000 gpd capacity.

But in the pending agreement with the school system, Brooklet will guarantee sufficient capacity to serve the three named Southeast Bulloch schools, "which the parties have estimated to be 100,000 gallons per day."

Additionally, although the school district will pay for construction of a 300,000-gallon water tower, and officials have blocked off a 1.5-acre site for it on a map of the school district property, the agreement provides that the city of Brooklet "shall have the right to increase the size of the 300,000-gallon water tank at its sole discretion," provided that the city would then be responsible for all costs resulting from the increased size.

"There's a good possibility, if the town can afford to, that we're going to upsize that tank to a 500,000," Gwinnett said. 

Fire protection goal

The agreement "will boost everything for the whole town," with one of the goals being to improve the Brooklet area's Insurance Services Office fire protection rating, according to Gwinnett.

"I think this is a perfect, classic example of how the cities, the county and the school system can work together," he said.

May be annexed

The agreement also provides for how all three Southeast Bulloch schools may in the future be taken in as part of Brooklet after the high school has so long been near the town but not in it. In exchange for being charged in-town rates instead of higher out-of-town rates from the start, the school district "will submit an application to the city for the school facilities to be annexed into the municipal boundaries," states Part 7 of the agreement. But this will only occur if and when the annexation is permitted under Georgia law, it adds.