In the coming months, Lansdale Borough Council and I will begin to discuss and debate the reality that our sewer system is in dire need of repair and upgrade. Undoubtedly, the challenge that lies before us is vast in both its breadth and expense. This will be one of the most complex and nuanced conversations that our community has faced and is not going to be so simple as “just invest in fixing the sewer.”
Let me begin with a clear and unwavering personal belief: I am not going to ever support the sale of our sewer system. No matter how much work is necessary, or how much it will cost, or how much money is offered. That option, for me, is unacceptable.
So, how did we get here?
Nearly every mile of sewer pipe that exists in Lansdale today was installed just over 100 years ago and is beginning, or has already, reached the end of its useful life. This means that you can see cracking and active deterioration within the sewer lines themselves and that they are beginning to give way to weight of the earth and roadwork above.
To be clear, this is not a new problem. The sewer lines have been patched and repaired over the years, but few have been fully replaced due to the cost of the replacement. As I have noted in prior musings, for too long, mostly during the 80s and 90s, our community delayed infrastructure repairs to offset potential budget gaps — rather than increasing taxes — with a large bank of electrical funds that has since been spent. During this time, the sewer lines were beginning to show signs of weakness and they were patched to extend their life without addressing the underlying issue.
Over the last 15 years or so, council has been actively working to replace as much sewer as possible in coordination with road repair. This ensures that the road is properly repaired while also addressing the underlying sewer challenge — but this approach can only persist for so long. If we had started this process in 1980, we likely would have had the time to fully complete our sewer replacement in coordination with road repair to avoid the situation we find ourselves in today. Hindsight, I suppose, is always 20/20.
So, how do we go forward?
To properly frame the challenge, Lansdale needs around $15 million to $20 million in sewer repair within the next decade. This is far better than most communities because of the process that began over the last 15 years. However, our need to address this has rapidly moved to a necessity and we no longer have the benefit of time on our side. Each year, we find new sink holes that are opening where the sewer line has failed. Every time that occurs, the repair of both the roadway and the sewer line goes up in cost and becomes an urgent problem.
To add complexity to the problem is the reality that even if $15 to $20 million showed up tomorrow to pay for these repairs, we likely could not do them because we cannot reasonably manage that much work in the borough without interrupting everyone’s daily lives and without hiring significantly more staff to manage the construction process. In the end, we will need to find a way to balance added investment in the road and sewer repair on an accelerated timeline without overextending our capacity for work.
Finally, and critically, we will need to figure out how to fund this work. I wish, as I am sure you all do, we had the sizable electric fund that was spent down to nothing over the span of three decades to help, or even fully, fund this project. However, that money is long gone, but I believe that within that retrospective lens is the answer to our funding problem in the long term. We must think four-dimensionally about this problem and build services that residents value, like our electric department, that can help fund these community wide challenges over the span of several years. Obviously, the sewer system will need to be repaired again — hopefully, not for another 100 years — and with it will be the same issues we face today.
Since there is no way for us to do all the work at once, taking out a loan to fund our sewer replacement doesn’t make sense. However, it is my estimation that taking out a loan to build a service that continually generates revenue for the borough, while also paying back the loan used to build that offering, makes much more sense. Especially if the offering is something every home in Lansdale needs.
Those who are readers of this column know Municipal 5G is my preferred answer to this need. It checks all the boxes and is a service that can grow with the community while funding repairs across the borough over the next several decades.
Again, the conversation about how to accelerate our sewer repair challenges is just getting underway and there is more to understand and discuss before any action is taken. In the meantime, state Rep. Steve Malagari and state Sen. Maria Collete have aided the borough by helping us receive state grants to address active sewer projects where the need is absolute and imminent.
State grants are helpful, and greatly appreciated, but they are a band-aid to our bigger problem, and we need to address this challenge forthrightly with the vision it deserves by widening our gaze to address the wider funding challenge that we will inevitably face again.
(Mayoral Musings is a weekly op-ed column submitted to North Penn Now, courtesy of Lansdale Borough Mayor Garry Herbert. The views expressed are his own.)
See also:
Mayoral Musings: Exploring the Elimination of Electric Deposits for Renters
Mayoral Musings: Willow Street Solar Project
Mayoral Musings: North Penn Black History Oratorical Competition
Mayoral Musings: Annual Lansdale Police Report Preview
Mayoral Musings: Opening of Classic Game Junkie and Retroware Arcade
