Western Butler County Authority, while not yet seeing the questions posed to it by three of its member municipalities following a meeting in mid-September, looks forward to a more collaborative approach toward its next major upgrade.

The authority, known as WBCA, submitted a proposed Act 537 plan to Jackson and Lancaster townships, Harmony and Zelienople — the four municipalities that incorporated WBCA — in November 2020. Although Jackson Township and Harmony approved the plan, Lancaster and Zelienople took no action on the plan until WBCA withdrew the proposal in June.

Much of the pause for Lancaster and Zelienople had to do with the cost of the project — roughly $64 million combined between a pump station upgrade and an overhaul of WBCA's water pollution control facility — and the impact on ratepayers.

And despite a protracted back-and-forth between the two municipalities and WBCA about whether cheaper options were available, the question still remains.

WBCA manager Autumn Crawford said while the authority provided a slew of answers to Lancaster and Zelienople over the costs of the project, the wall between the authority and the municipalities remains.

“There's some sort of breakdown in communications where we're either not understanding the questions in the way that they are asking it or they are not understanding the answers in the way we are providing them,” Crawford said.

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