HEUVELTON — Mayor Barbara A. Lashua says the village is still researching funding sources for a $5.8 million project aimed at replacing the water tower and upgrading the entire village water system.

“Engineering is all but completed,” she said Monday, but finding a funding source with a palatable interest rate has been challenging.

“We’re weighing our options,” she said.

Because of relatively low rates – it costs $260 a year for a household in Heuvelton to access unlimited water – Mrs. Lashua says the village will qualify for no grant money. This requires the village to finance the project on its own.

Beginning with a new water tower, the village hopes to make upgrades on Lisbon Street and parts of Water Street.

Phase two of the project includes identifying another water source besides the well currently feeding the entire village, and upgrading the rest of the water system.

The water tower itself will cost $1.3 million.

But Mrs. Lashua says the time, especially for the water tower, is now because the tower would cost more to refurbish than to replace.

The current tower is capable of holding 100,000 gallons while the village is using 113,000 a day.

“It’s almost not a storage tank,” she said, explaining that it is important for water to sit in the tower for some time to ensure it is exposed to purifying chlorine. Currently the village is working with the U.S. Department of Agriculture Rural Development program in order to fund the program at a 2 percent interest rate, but Mrs. Lashua said no arrangement has been finalized.

The village has a voluntary water conservation program in place asking residents to reduce their water usage as recent dry weather threatens the well’s reserves.

Thousands of readers like you have made Northern New York Newspapers the number one ranked website* for local news and sports coverage in the north country.

You can continue on to this article in a few seconds, or you can visit one of our websites:

• Watertown Daily Times
• The Ogdensburg Journal
• Daily Courier-Observer