LAWRENCE COUNTY Sewage updates discussed

Businesses want a good quality of life for their workers, so having clean water is vital to economic development, a researcher said.
By LAURE CIOFFI
VINDICATOR NEW CASTLE BUREAU
NEW CASTLE, Pa. -- It's going to take an estimated $100 million dollars for Lawrence County's sewage systems to comply with state and federal standards, a new study says.
And the figure balloons to about $5 billion to $7 billion for the entire southwestern Pennsylvania region, researcher Jan Lauer said.
Those costs are too high for any one community to handle, so local officials are looking to a regional approach, Lauer added.
Nonprofit group: Lauer is a senior project manager for the Pennsylvania Economy League, a nonprofit group that studies community issues for local municipalities, which is putting the study together for the Southwestern Pennsylvania Water and Sewage Infrastructure Project steering committee.
Complete findings will be released in April.
The study was commissioned in January 2000 by the Southwestern Pennsylvania Commission, an organization of county commissioners and other leaders in the region, when the project steering committee formed.
Steering committee members -- about 60 state, local and business leaders -- say they hope the study will spur a new organization that will educate and advocate for a 10-county region.
"Individual municipalities and authorities have taken steps locally to deal with this problem, but this fragmented, unfocused approach is inefficient and ineffective. A regional strategy is required that directs investment to where the greatest gain can be derived," said Jared L. Cohon, chairman of the project steering committee and president of Carnegie-Mellon University in Pittsburgh.
Counties involved: Besides Lawrence County, the region includes Allegheny, Armstrong, Beaver, Butler, Fayette, Greene, Indiana, Washington and Westmoreland counties, with some involvement from Somerset County, Lauer said.
"We found that every county has every problem represented. There is the appearance that Allegheny County has all urban issues, but there are actually a lot of failing septic tanks, and Greene County has public sewer problems," Lauer said.
Old systems: The problems stem from old sewage systems built in the early 1900s and soil and water table problems that affect private septic systems.
Lauer said addressing the problems regionally could bring down repair costs.
"Water is like air. It doesn't respect political boundaries. When you have [sewage] discharge in a stream, it's going to make its way [downstream to the next community]. We are constantly drinking each other's sewage. We are all related through this water network," she said.
Keeping the water clean through a good sanitary sewer system is vital to economic development.
"If a business is looking to locate somewhere, they want a good quality of life for their employees. They are also interested in making sure water and sewer service is in place where they want to locate," she said.
Hired groups: Lauer said members of the study committee are hoping to implement the findings through organizations hired to work on those issues.
One organization could provide technical assistance and public education for communities working on sewage problems, another could focus on advocacy for policy changes and getting state and federal money to pay for projects, and a third would create goals and priorities for clean water in the region.