The City of Kalona will hold a bid hearing next month for the multi-million dollar construction project involving several mandated improvements at the city’s wastewater treatment facility.

The hearing will be held Tuesday, May 12th, at 11 a.m. at Kalona City Hall. City Administrator Ryan Schlabaugh says the project is one of the largest ever undertaken by the City of Kalona, with the construction estimate coming in at $6.16 million. After adding engineering and contingency costs, Schlabaugh says he hopes the project will come in shy of $7 million. 

Schlabaugh says the upgrades are needed following requirements from the Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Protection Agency, “We have a three-cell lagoon system, and the DNR and EPA are moving away from those twice yearly discharge permits, and would like to get us to a continuous discharge. And to do that, we have to upgrade our system. So, it will take a much smaller footprint, but it comes with a fairly substantial upfront cost to put that system in.”

Schlabaugh says there has been a lot of interest in the project, and hopes to get construction started this summer, with the transition completed by April of 2027.