WRIGHTSVILLE BEACH — Wrightsville Beach residents will now have access to a regional utility system promising clean water and resilient infrastructure.
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The Cape Fear Public Utility Authority officially assumed ownership and operational control of the Town of Wrightsville Beach’s water and sewer system on Tuesday, Sept. 30, marking the culmination of a multi-year effort to ensure a sustainable water supply for the town. For the island’s 2,800 utility customers, this means a shift to CFPUA rates and monthly bills. Additionally, the clock starts now on the $25-million fix-up plan to address the town’s water supply issues — namely saltwater intrusion, well contamination and aging pipes.
As of today, Wrightsville Beach residents are officially CFPUA customers, which means they will transition from the town’s former bimonthly water and sewer billing cycle to CFPUA’s monthly billing. Residents should expect to receive their final town water and sewer bill in October and their first bill from CFPUA come November.
Rates and fees are based on fixed meter size and a consumption charge per 1,000 gallons, as other CFPUA customers pay. While the overall rates are similar to what the town charged, CFPUA public information officer Cammie Bellamy noted the shift in billing frequency and rate structure means individual bills will change. CFPUA will distribute a detailed rate schedule in a letter to residents this week.
Part of the necessity for the merger stems from the high cost and scope of the necessary utility upgrades, which the town could not afford alone without raising rates. The solution was a $25-million state allocation from the 2023 Appropriations Act — $17 million to CFPUA and $8 million to Wrightsville Beach. CFPUA has already finished its first priority of upgrading 2,700 customer water meters to a remote-reading system.
Next, the authority will tackle its largest project: installing a new 16-inch water main and 14-inch wastewater force main beneath the Intracoastal Waterway. The new lines will serve as a secondary set of utility connections, intended to prevent service disruption if the primary lines fail.
Earlier this month, the CFPUA Board of Directors approved an $11 -million design-build contract with Crowder Construction for the project. According to Bellamy, the goal is to start work on the Intracoastal Waterway project by the end of 2025.
The new infrastructure is designed to permanently resolve the island’s chronic water quality issues, specifically saltwater intrusion, taste and odor, and the concern over PFAS contamination in the old groundwater wells. CFPUA already supplied about 40% of the town’s water through a wholesale agreement established in 2018.
“As that project [ICWW water main] comes online, we’ll actually be able to take the town’s existing groundwater wells offline and provide more and more of the town’s water from our Sweeney Water Treatment Plant,” Bellamy stated.
With the consolidation, CFPUA’s long-term goal is to provide 100% granular activated carbon-filtered water from the Sweeney plant. The GAC system was installed by CFPUA in 2022 to combat PFAS contamination in the water supply and it has since decreased the “forever chemicals” to undetectable levels in finished drinking water. The town’s wells will be kept only in an “emergency status” for high-demand or drought scenarios.
Discussions about a utility partnership between Wrightsville Beach and the regional system predate the formation of the CFPUA, reaching back nearly 50 years. The first cooperation began in 1976, when the town started planning a wastewater infrastructure partnership with the City of Wilmington and New Hanover County. The necessity for modern infrastructure finally drove the entities to formally explore the consolidation in 2022 when they secured a state grant for a feasibility study. The consolidation agreement was signed by both parties in 2024, leading to Tuesday’s official transfer.
“This has been a long time coming and it’s going to allow us to improve a lot of services and infrastructure throughout town,” Bellamy said.
Residents with questions about new water and sewer usage or billing should contact CFPUA’s customer service department. Residents with questions about usage or billing issues that occurred prior to today’s official transfer must contact Wrightsville Beach.
More information on the consolidation can be found here.
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