Croton Falls Sewer District Project Moves Forward

NORTH SALEM, N.Y. - The North Salem Town Board last month authorized Supervisor Warren Lucas to enter into an intermunicipal agreement (IMA) with Somers that would allow the town to hook up Croton Falls to the Heritage Hills sewage treatment plant.

It was one of many steps that have to be taken before a sewer district can be formed in the hamlet and the construction phase of the proposed $11 million project can get underway.

The IMA was approved by Somers at the Town Board’s Dec. 5 work session.

Lucas read a statement at the board’s Nov. 26 meeting explaining the long history behind the push for public sewers, the funding aspect, and logistics.

“My goal throughout this process, which has taken many years, is to protect the business district of the hamlet so that they are in place and prosperous for years to come,” he said.

One of the things Lucas highlighted was the town’s plan to use its $526,000 American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) grant to compensate Somers for 20,000 gallons of capacity at the plant, which has an excess capacity of 300,000 gallons.

The payment also accounts for tearing up roads in Somers when the pipes are installed.

The town had weighed other options over the years such as the Seven Springs property on Route 22, adjacent to a nursing/rehabilitation center which has a sewer plant with 19,000 gallons of unused capacity. The O&M costs would be significantly more, Lucas said.

The town also owns property behind Primavera Restaurant where it could have built its own plant and a site adjacent to the railroad tracks, where tile fields could be installed should septic systems in the General Business District fail.
Concerned about the process itself, Councilwoman Katherine Daniels cast the sole “no” on the IMA resolution.

She had four reasons.

One, that the town hadn’t had any “public engagement” on whether the ARPA funds should be used for “this purpose as opposed to other projects that would benefit more town residents,” Daniels said.

Neither had the town, in her opinion, had any “meaningful public engagement as to the pros and cons of creating a sewer district.”

“The few residents who have thought about this want to know whether this could change the character of the village and what our plan is to manage that prospect. Unfortunately, we don’t have one,” Daniels told North Salem News later.

She noted that the town is working on a master plan for Croton Falls but “so far it does not grapple with these issues in any meaningful way.”

Pointing out that the town still yet conducted a needs analysis for the people in the hamlet who are not in the business district or prepared a map, plan and report (MPR), Daniels said that “these steps are required before the district can be formed.”

“In my view, they should have come first,” she said, adding: “As a result, we don’t have concrete data as to whether we are purchasing the right capacity from Somers or even targeting the right properties for inclusion in the proposed district.”

Hahn Engineering, the town’s consultants, has been asked to plan to do a needs assessment of properties – both commercial and residential – involved. That should cost about $9,000, Lucas said.

Lucas said he’d provided Town Board members with documents, including a sample letter to Croton Falls folks letting them know that the assessment will be happening, a quote from Hahn Engineering on the cost of the project -- $10.93 million covers “all of the engineering, build, legal, and contingency for the General Business District” -- and questions to ask each property owner.

There will be a public informational meeting on the proposed sewer district held at the North Salem Community Center (3 Owens Road) on Monday, Jan. 6, at a time to be announced.

“The primary focus of concern” has been the businesses, Lucas said.

The project might be done in two parts: Phase One involves the businesses and Phase Two, the residences.

According to Lucas, there are 30 non-residential properties that could be included in Phase One, including Primavera (and the town-owned land around it) and a gas station on Route 22. Municipal properties listed as being in the proposed sewer district are the Croton Falls Fire House on Sun Valley Drive and the North Salem Community Center on Owens Road.

There are 75 residential properties in the hamlet’s water district. These could hook up as well if Phase Two goes forward.

It’s required that the town asks property owners if they want to be included in the sewer district.

Lucas said that he’d had discussions with some of the businesses in Croton Falls in 2018 about sewers and that “they were very much in favor of them.”

When asked when that would be possible, Lucas said he told them: “By 2025 as it would take that long to line up grants and a sewer plant location.”

After considering multiple options, the town landed on the Heritage Hills plant.

“It was a back-and-forth negotiation with many highs and lows,” Lucas said of talks with Somers, adding that the two towns “came to an understanding” last March.

He then read a letter that he had sent to Somers Supervisor Robert Scorrano to thank him and the Somers Town Board for their “support and cooperation.”

The sewer connection not only signifies, Lucas wrote, “a pivotal step forward in addressing the infrastructure needs of our small business district, but it also underscores the spirit of cooperation and partnership between our neighboring towns.”

“Our towns share more than just a border; North Salem has residents of Somers in our school district, and our emergency services personnel collaborate closely in mutual aid responses. This approval exemplifies the strong bond between our municipalities and reaffirms Somers as a steadfast friend to North Salem,” he wrote.

Funding Source 

Lucas said that the town already has two grants to apply towards the project’s capital costs.

These total $9.25 million: $8 million from the state Department of Environmental Conservation and the New York City Department of Environmental Protection and $1.25 million from Congressman Michael Lawler’s office.

It also has “partial approval” for a $4.8 million Water Quality Improvement Grant (WQIP), which is money given to Westchester by the NYCDEP.

Lucas explained that the county Planning Department is waiting for the Somers/North Salem IMA to be complete before it acts on the town’s grant request.

The money then has to be approved by county planners, the county executive’s office, the county Legislature, and the DEP.

Lucas said that the $9.25 million won’t be available until mid-2025 because New York City’s and the federal government’s 2025/2026 fiscal years start in July.

He believed that the portion of the $4.8 million would be freed up “in the same timeline.”

“That totals a potential $14.57 million for capital costs, engineering and legal,” Lucas said, adding that the town has also applied for other grants.

The residential properties outlined in the water district map “may find that they need to connect to the sewer district also,” he said, noting that that “will depend in part on the needs assessment.”

“We have the ability to take on homes in distress but those homes would not be required to connect to the district. Typically homes in the district, even if they are not connected, must pay down a portion of the capital costs. In this case I am planning on sufficient capital funds such that there will be no capital costs,” Lucas said.

Then there’s the question of operating and maintenance.

If the district needed to buy a capacity of 10,000 gallons per day, that would cost just under $40,000 a year. At 20,000 gallons per day, that would be $60,000, Lucas estimated.

The annual O&M fee for individual property owners works out to an estimated average of $1,270.92, Lucas said.

If they use 100 gallons per day, they could pay $702.28 a year; at 200 GPD, that would be $924.55; 300 GPD, $1,146,83; 400 GPD, $1,369.10; and 500, $1,591.38.

Next Steps 

According to Lucas, there’s still a lot of work to be done.

The town needs to finalize a financial agreement with Heritage Development LLC and an engineering agreement for the physical pipe hookup with the plant’s operators, Veolia Inc.

Lucas said the town has letters of intent to hook up from both entities. They are waiting for the IMA to be finalized.

“Once the needs assessment is completed and people concur with the steps we are taking, a town sewer district needs to be created.”

That will require the town to finalize a map, plan, and report, which is a document that sets the boundaries of the district and shows which properties are in it.

Rationale 

The project would include a below-ground pump station on the New York City Department of Environmental Protection property behind Back Street similar to the one located at the North Salem Middle/High School that’s connected to the Peach Lake sewage treatment plant. The DEP has already approved two sites.

The pump station alone is expected to cost around $5 million, almost half of the entire project.

Many of the businesses’ septic systems and cesspools are not actually on their properties, but under town roadways and on land belonging to the NYCDEP. The Muscoot Reservoir, a source of drinking water for New York City, is nearby.

“None of them had sufficient areas to repair their system if they stopped working,” Lucas explained, noting that that’s a health concern.

Because of the situation, certain businesses have to pump out their systems multiple times.

That especially affects establishments that serve food. The county Health Department limits the number of tables and requires them to use paper/plastic plates and utensils instead of washable ones, he said, noting that this leads to “large amounts of waste and higher costs.”

Revisiting many of the points he made at the meeting, Lucas later called the IMA with Somers “critical to complete” because “it now gives us a solution for our sewage.”

“Sewers will address some of the basic problems that the community has,” he added.

Daniels said that her fourth reason for voting “no” was that the project “is very expensive.”

She praised Lucas for having done “a remarkable job of finding grant money to cover the roughly $11 million estimated construction cost.”

However, Daniels pointed out that the town has not “conducted a rigorous cost/benefit analysis to determine whether an investment of this magnitude is worth it given the small number of businesses and residents that will be able to participate.”

Lucas also addressed concerns about the way the town plans to use its ARPA money.

The federal grant originally “could be used for water and sewer infrastructure and emergency services surrounding the COVID pandemic,” he said, noting that after the town received it “the allowed uses were broadened” and that there had been a discussion about other projects that the money could be applied toward.

“However, I believe that this is the most important thing that we can do with the ARPA grant as it will support the hamlet and allow it to exist and even flourish for years to come,” Lucas said.

Planning Board Chair Cynthia Curtis had a thought or two to share about who should be included in the district.

“The hamlet is a residential one just like the rest of town and the homeowners, who far outnumber the businesses, are the heart and soul of Croton Falls,” she said, adding: “Every grant application mentions the businesses, not the residents.”

According to Curtis, in one Lucas indicated that he wanted the sewer district for transit-oriented development. In another he emphasized expansion for businesses and another talked about the potential impacts of the Metro-North Railroad’s new 450-space commuter parking lot, she said.

“There will be no transit-oriented development mentioned by Mrs. Curtis in Croton Falls as we simply do not have the capacity,” Lucas responded.

“For many residents, their home is their single most important investment. Some are limited because their septic is below current standards, some because their lots are so small or their soils do not support fields. They cannot add a bedroom when their family needs one. They cannot upgrade their septic,” she said.

Curtis claimed that to date, the Town Board has only met and talked with business owners.

She questioned how the town could “say that the businesses are more important than the residents when they have no idea what their situation is?”

“Croton Falls has been a thriving business area for over two hundred years, until COVID hit. Every business is open now. How successful a business is is not a function of the septic, it’s whether or not they are offering what the area will support,” she said.

The bottom line to Curtis?

“No one knows if the residents want to be a sewer district or not; no one has asked. No one has assessed their needs and no one has calculated the costs for a district that would include them. Now the project has two phases and the residents are the afterthought. Why?” she asked.