Black Oak, AR – (JonesboroRightNow.com) – Sept. 5, 2025 – The town of Black Oak received a hefty grant that will go toward an upgrade decades in the making.
Arkansas Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders and the Arkansas Economic Development Commission announced Aug. 21 more than $11.9 million in funding from the Community Development Block Grant and State Rural Community Grant programs, according to a news release from the governor’s office.
Only one community in Craighead County received a General Assistance Block Grant, that being Black Oak. The town received $500,000 that will be used for a new wastewater collection system, a project that is expected to cost $2.5 million overall.
Mayor Eddie Dunigan said the additional money will help offset project costs. He explained that not having a sewer in the area creates limitations, making it difficult for businesses to be established and the town to apply for lower-rent government housing.
“If someone’s house burns, they’ve got less than a half-acre lot most of the time. FHA [Federal Housing Authority] guidelines for a septic tank is an acre and a third. We don’t have any acre-and-a-third lots, and so they either have to sell out and move on, or they can move into a mobile home,” he said.
The application for the grant was approved in 2019, but Dunigan said they had been dealing with paperwork since that time. Planning for the system has been a four-decade process, but Dunigan said they got serious about the project almost 10 years ago.
Currently, residents in Black Oak pay a flat rate of $15 for water services. Although the price tag on the sewer project is $2.5 million, Dunigan emphasized that residents will not have to pay anything extra once the installation is complete. That includes keeping the flat rate the same.
“After we get it up and running over there, it will pay to fill in their septic system, hook them up, and at no cost to them,” he said. “We have a lot of people on fixed income, and it’s a struggle for them to even pay their water and sewer bill. It’s going to be a change for them.”
As of now, no contractor has been selected for the project, though Dunigan said he hopes the bidding process will begin at the beginning of 2026. He said they are waiting on the U.S. Department of Agriculture to tell them when it is time to seek and submit bids.
Weather permitting, construction on the project is expected to begin the same year, with Dunigan projecting that it should take about four months for the project to be completed. In that time, he explained that residents should not expect any traffic delays or other issues that may arise.
Completing a project decades in the making is something that Dunigan said will make a big difference to Black Oak, as it can open new opportunities to the community.
“It’s the ideal location for the husband working at a steel mill at Osceola or Blytheville, and the wife works somewhere in Jonesboro, and they can both travel the same distance there and be home,” he said.
