Five rural communities on the eastern edge of El Paso County are shedding decades of aging septic tanks for good. U.S. Representative Veronica Escobar and the Lower Valley Water District will host a ribbon-cutting ceremony Tuesday at 9:30 a.m. at 5000 Bridgeway Drive in Clint, Texas, celebrating the completion of the ARPA Lower Valley Wastewater Infrastructure Program, a $33.3 million investment that has delivered public wastewater infrastructure to homes and communities that historically relied on individual septic systems.
The project, first reported by KTSM 9 News, supported 862 service connections across five Lower Valley communities: Wildhorse, Angels Park, Valle Bonito, Athena West, and Hacienda Real. El Paso County provided approximately $25.1 million in ARPA funding, while the Lower Valley Water District contributed $8.21 million in local funding, according to the same report. Crews built roughly 17.5 miles of sewer infrastructure and two lift stations to make the connections possible.
El Paso County and its partners broke ground on the program in July 2024, a groundbreaking that marked both the beginning of construction and what organizers described as a shared commitment to expanding wastewater infrastructure throughout the Lower Valley, per the station's report. Officials say the finished program has strengthened public health, environmental protection, and the region's long-term infrastructure across the five communities.
Why Septic Tanks Became a Public Health Problem
The push to get colonias off septic systems reflects a documented regulatory mismatch. A 2025 technical report from the North American Development Bank found that average lot sizes in Angels Park run about one-third of an acre, smaller than Texas's half-acre minimum regulatory requirement for septic systems. That undersized footprint accelerates soil saturation and raises the risk of groundwater contamination from failing tanks that are roughly 30 years old, per NADBank.
A scoping review published by IWA Publishing in September 2022 found that low-income residents in El Paso County colonias routinely dealt with standing wastewater, foul odors, and severe financial stress tied to maintaining those aging systems, with routine pumping fees often out of reach for fixed-income households. Research published on ResearchGate in June 2026, evaluating roughly $1 billion in Texas-Mexico border infrastructure spending, found that installing central wastewater systems in rural colonias led to a 24% reduction in hepatitis A incidence rates.
NADBank Grant Covered the Hookup Gap in Angels Park
Mainline construction alone does not automatically connect a home to the grid. Individual residents are generally responsible for paying contractors to hook up their household plumbing and decommission old septic tanks, a cost that can be prohibitive for low-income families, according to NADBank. In Angels Park specifically, a $750,000 grant from NADBank's Community Assistance Program helped cover those household connection costs, as reported by Texas Border Business in February. NADBank project metrics show that connecting the 322 households in Angels Park to the central wastewater network removes unmaintained septic tanks and collects approximately 82,400 gallons of sewage daily for proper municipal treatment.
How the Funding Was Divided Across Communities
Local funding for these projects has been assembled from multiple sources over several years. A Lower Valley Water District presentation published by the City of Socorro in April 2024 outlined a $35 million bond election, approved by voters that May, that allocated $5.46 million to Athena West, $6.45 million to Valle Bonito, $848,000 to Wildhorse, and $592,000 to Hacienda Real. Separately, financial disclosures published by Edward Jones in July 2025 showed the Town of Clint committed $758,737 in combined ARPA and municipal funds under a cost-sharing agreement with the water district to loop water service lines and extend central sewer infrastructure.
The Lower Valley Water District itself was established by the Texas Legislature in 1985 and operates as a municipal utility district under Chapters 49 and 54 of the Texas Water Code, managing water and sewer systems across rural eastern El Paso County, per the Edward Jones bond documentation. The county's $34 million commitment to first-time water and wastewater services, documented in an August 2022 American Rescue Plan Act compliance report, was designed to align with federal Justice40 guidelines directing federal environmental benefits toward historically underserved border communities.
More Work Remains in the Region
Tuesday's ribbon-cutting is a milestone, not a finish line for the broader regional effort. A March 2026 status report from NADBank indicated that completing the Lower Valley wastewater connections brought the district to seven finished projects out of 11 funded through a $23 million regional infrastructure bond executed in 2021, which originally targeted more than 800 rural residences. Escobar has been involved in similar efforts elsewhere in the county; Hoodline previously reported on her push for a $4M sewer upgrade in Vinton.
