Council OKs borrowing for sewer project
The city will borrow $130,000 to design a project to separate the sewer and stormwater systems in a portion of the Hasbrouck Combined Sewer Overflow Sewershed in Downtown Kingston.
“This will really be a help to our environment and to the capacity of our wastewater treatment plant,” Alderman Patrick O’Reilly said during a recent meeting of the Common Council. O’Reilly, a nonenrolled voter who represents Ward 7, said separating the sewage from stormwater runoff is important for the future and will help to keep the Rondout Creek clean.
The council voted 8-0 to approve the borrowing. Alderman William Carey, DWard 5, was absent.
City Engineer John Schultheis previously told lawmakers that Kingston received a $600,000 grant from the state Department of Environmental Conservation to fund construction work for the separation project. He said, though, that the grant would not cover the design costs, leading to the request for borrowing.
The entire separation project is estimated to cost more than $1 million, Schultheis had said. He said his office will return to the council to request additional funding.
Schultheis said the majority of the work on the project is to be done in the area of the Rondout Gardens apartment complex. He said additional phases of separation work could be done as grant funding becomes available.
In a letter to Common Council President James Noble, city Environmental Specialist Sean Koester said the Hasbrouck Combined Sewer Overflow system generates 92 percent of the wastewater discharged into the Rondout Creek in a typical year. He said removing the stormwater inflow from the system would reduce overflows to the creek, which would improve its water quality. It also would reduce costs at the city’s wastewater treatment plant, Koester said.