News

December 31, 2009

Nuangola plans reply to sewer complainants

IAN CAMPBELL Times Leader Correspondent

NUANGOLA – Council will respond by Jan. 28 to letters outlining complaints about the borough’s sewer project that residents have filed with the state Department of Environmental Protection, even though the council has no idea what it could do differently.

The letters received by DEP from 38 signatories outlined what the writers felt were unsupportive moves the borough had taken in regard to the sewer project, but as solicitor Cynthia Ray noted, the problem with the project was beyond anything any council could have resolved.

“Even if the same council that approved the project had been in office, they could not move forward because of the challenge to the condemnation of property in Rice Township,” the solicitor said.

Council noted many of the letter writers had originally supported the project.

The fact that DEP was willing to address the concerns of the letter writers in this instance, while ignoring the comments of residents opposed to the project earlier in the proceeding did not sit well with Councilman Anthony Deluca, who was recently elected to a second term.

“If the plan had been done properly in the first place, we would be well on the way to having a sewer system,” he said.

He said the project was a good one but the planning had been wrong, and none of the current council members had been involved in any part of the project’s initial set-up and administration.

“This is due to sewer authority mismanagement,” Deluca said.

The five initial members of the authority, who established and oversaw the project’s start, were all appointed by the council that drove the plan, he said. By the time a new council was making appointments, the money was already misspent, he said.

He also said charges that septic systems were leaking into the lake and into wells did not seem to be borne out by studies by the sewer enforcement officer, William Bilby.

Bilby had been unable to find any serious faults in 45 properties, even after frequent re-examinations of some of the properties of those who had complained to the DEP, Deluca said.

Deluca said the council is unclear what the state could do to force the borough into action on the plan. He said the route chosen to connect the borough’s sewers to the Mountaintop Area Joint Sewer Authority has been blocked by Rice Township property owners whose land the line would cross. Also, he said, the system cannot be introduced or fees levied for it until it is operating, which has resulted in the loss of a bank loan expected to fund part of the early stages of the project.

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