Westmoreland authority may bid for city’s sewage service

In an effort to pay for its pension costs, the city of McKeesport announced last month it is selling its municipal authority, but it’s anybody’s guess who will buy the sewage treatment and waste collection service.

With the deadline for all proposals to purchase the authority set for today, McKeesport could soon join the ranks of other regional municipalities that have sold their municipal authorities to solve financial troubles. But potential buyers,

such as the Municipal Authority of Westmoreland County, have remained silent prior to the deadline on whether they will make a bid for McKeesport’s 22,000 accounts.

“We’re in the process to determine whether we’ll be doing that,” Chris Kerr, manager of the Westmoreland municipal authority, said last week. “We have not reached a conclusion.”

Before making a bid, the Westmoreland municipal authority will consider whether it can save money on the purchase. If Westmoreland believes it can reduce the operating expenses on McKeesport’s 22,000 accounts by “eliminating duplicated services,” it will make an offer, Mr. Kerr said. Westmoreland current serves roughly 140,000 accounts.

McKeesport hired an external agency to collect purchase proposals by today, at which point McKeesport authorities will review the offers and make a decision. The city announced in early July that it would sell its municipal authority after the city accidentally spent around $700,000 in state funds earmarked for pension costs. The error led the city to default on its $2.3 million annual pension obligation last year. McKeesport Mayor Michael Cherepko did not respond to requests for comment.

To keep the auctioning process competitive, Mr. Kerr said he could not estimate how much Westmoreland might offer McKeesport, if it decides to make a proposal. In early July, Hempfield agreed to sell its sewer authority — which has almost 10,000 fewer customers than McKeesport — to the Municipal Authority of Westmoreland County for an estimated $67 million. In that sale agreement, all 24 jobs in the Hempfield system were preserved.

Solicitors, engineers and accountants are among the “duplicated services” the Westmoreland municipal authority might cut in order to save money. Mr. Kerr said encompassing the McKeesport accounts would increase the workload of current Westmoreland municipal authority staff, but he added he believes the staff would be capable of handling the additional work.

In addition to serving McKeesport, the city’s authority provides waste collection and sewage treatment for residents of Duquesne, White Oak, Port Vue, Liberty, Dravosburg, Glassport and Versailles, a total of about 64,000 people.