Lockport stands by decision to stick with well water over Lake Michigan

Lockport — The city of Lockport reiterated its commitment to staying on its well water system, even as neighboring cities Joliet, Romeoville and Crest Hill take steps towards a transition to Lake Michigan water.

During the Committee of the Whole meeting on Wednesday, elected officials, led by Mayor Steven Streit and Alderman Darren Deskin, explained the steps the city has taken in the past decade to improve Lockport’s water infrastructure and the decision to avoid the switch to lake water.

Deskin and Streit are running against each other for mayor, which is up for election April 1.

In addition to recent progress in Joliet and Crest Hill’s water switch, Lockport residents reportedly expressed concerns about unusually high bills in January.

“It was kind of a perfect storm,” Streit said. “‘Why is my bill so high?’ turned into ‘if I’m paying so much money for this water I don’t even like, why don’t we get [Illinois] American water?‘”

Streit explained that the high bills were a product of three factors: a rate increase put through to fund the construction of a new $60 million wastewater treatment plant replacing the current plant which is over 60 years old, the fact that December’s billing period totaled five weeks instead of four and the annual issue of the holidays often leading to increased water consumption.

“Because of all that, the bills were high last month, which naturally would be concerning,” Streit said.

Streit also noted that the city will consider delaying implementing future rate increases until March of the given year – a historically low water usage month – in order to avoid this combination of factors in the future.

Infrastructure improvements

According to Streit and Deskin, who were both elected for the first time in 2013, the city has been working for the past 12 years to improve and modernize the water system.

“The city was not very proactive in taking care of the water system,” Streit said. “It was in the red. They didn’t even bring in enough money to cover the bills for it. Water rates were very low, but they weren’t even covering the costs, so 12 years ago, we ended up raising them.”

Deskin also noted that the lack of prior maintenance in the water system, including aging, fragile water mains and multiple wells being shut down instead of repaired, had resulted in dangerously low pressure in the system when hydrants needed to be opened to fight fires.

“It was terrifying,” Deskin said of the situation in 2013. “We had water mains that were at least 80 years old, and they kept breaking, and breaking, and breaking, it was costing us 25 to 30 percent of the water we were pumping.”

Since 2011, the city has spent $186 million replacing water mains to improve the water pressure situation and water quality, which Streit described in some places as being “dark brown” from the buildup of sediments in the mains.

The city has also improved several wells and dug a new deeper well to feed into the system, and embarked on an ongoing initiative to help residents replace lead water feeds into their homes.

Water quality

Despite the improvements, residents are still unhappy with the water quality.

Multiple residents spoke at the meeting that they need to put filters and softeners for their water in their homes to make it drinkable, and that the well water creates problems for their appliances.

Residents also expressed concerns about the amount of dissolved solids in the water still and the potential negative health impacts it could have.

Streit told residents with concerns about their water quality to contact the city’s water department during business hours and that a representative could come out to check their water and look for solutions.

Alderwoman Joann Bartelson also suggested that the water department offer more in-depth testing of water inside people’s homes and not just at outside spigots to see if interior pipes are part of the problem.

“People’s health should be at the center of this issue,” she argued.

Costs to residents

Costs were a high priority for many residents who attended Wednesday’s meeting.

One resident, Ray Alcala, said that he had purchased filters for his water and invested in all new piping in his house over the years to improve the water quality, something he believes was worth the investment to not deal with exorbitant water prices.

Homer Township Trustee Michael Clausen, who was attending the meeting on other business, noted before the council that residents in Homer Glen, which gets Lake Michigan water supplied by the privately-run Illinois American have been complaining of water bills as high as $600 per month for a family of four at recent village meetings.

“It’s like signing up for cable,” Streit said. “They can offer you a low price for a year or three years, but when that contract is up, the prices go up, and then you’re stuck.”

In addition to the complications of dealing with a private company for the city’s water supply, Streit said that the infrastructure cost, on top of what has already been done in the city, would be very high.

“When Joliet decided to go to lake water they asked other towns if they wanted to go in on it with them,” Streit said. “It was a a $150 million buy-in just to get the pipes run. We don’t have $150 million to spend on that. The only way we could pay for it would be to increase the rates.”

Other costs cited by the city officials in the transition to lake water would be the construction of multiple water towers, continued maintenance of wells and water mains, and making sure the lake water was “blended properly” to avoid problems with sediment.

“It’s still a process,” Streit said. “Otherwise, you can end up like Flint, Michigan, where the new lake water hit the mains that had been using well water with a different PH for years, and all that sediment that had built up in the mains broke free and became a safety hazard.”

Streit also accused officials in other cities of misleading residents about the future of water costs.

“They’ve said the water rates won’t go up, but that’s unsustainable,” Streit said. “There is no way it is possible that those bills won’t go up.”