Virginia Gov. Tim Kaine announced the award of a grant Tuesday to connect 29 properties on Fairhope Road in Northwest Roanoke to an 8-inch sewer line.

The Southern Rivers Watershed Enhancement Program will pay for $202,060 of the $229,060 project, with the remaining $27,000 to be paid by the city.

"Most of the homes over there were built in the '40s and '50s," said Sarah Baumgardner, environmental communications coordinator for the Western Virginia Water Authority. "They have original septic systems that are getting to the end of their life spans. Some are starting to get close to failing, or are failing, which means you have untreated sewage leaching out into the ground and getting into the Roanoke River."

The project will result in the installation of about 2,175 feet of 8-inch sewer line to replace the septic tanks and take the sewage to the Roanoke Regional Water Pollution Control Plant.

Baumgardner said the water authority will have to get neighbors to agree to use the sewer line before engineering the line's design and eventually starting construction.

The Southern Rivers Watershed Enhancement Program is administered by the Virginia Department of Housing and Community Development and is designed to improve the water quality of Virginia's non-Chesapeake Bay watersheds, and is funded through Virginia's Water Quality Improvement Fund.

-- Mason Adams