Stephanie Dyer, environmental program manager at the Eastgate Regional Council of Governments in Youngstown, said algae growth promoted by nitrogen and phosphorus pollution from farm and lawn fertilizer runoff is a significant potential reservoir threat. Vigorito said the biggest threats to Meander water would be an uncontrolled algae bloom or spills related to oil and gas drilling. The plan, which is endorsed by the OEPA, was updated this year. Potential reservoir contamination sources, however, include 182 oil and gas wells 18 miles of oil and gas pipelines a 72-inch, above-ground pipe carrying Canfield sewage to Mahoning County’s Meander Creek Wastewater Treatment Plant and 145 road and eight rail crossings of the creek, the reservoir or its tributaries, according to MVSD’s drinking water source protection plan. In all of MVSD’s operation since its initiation in 1932, Meander Creek Reservoir has never been unavailable as a water source due to contamination, he said. In evaluating the project, MVSD should consider whether it’s likely in a water emergency that conditions at Meander and Berlin would differ significantly, said Johnson, a former MVSD board member.įunding sources could include low-interest loans from the Ohio Environmental Protection Agency, the Ohio Water Development Authority or the Ohio Public Works Commission, or possibly an OPWC grant, Vigorito said.Ī rate increase could be used to pay back a loan, he explained. “My main concern would be the impact on the rates that MVSD charges us,” and whether Youngstown would have to raise rates for consumers to whom it distributes MVSD water, said Harry L. The increase could be “a few pennies” per thousand gallons of water used per customer, and the duration of any increase would depend on the terms of a loan the district might get to pay for the project, he said.
“There most likely would have to be a rate increase to pay for that,” Vigorito said of the direct pipe from Berlin to the MVSD treatment plant. “Our sewer and water costs have just skyrocketed,” in the Mahoning Valley in recent years to pay for system improvements, she said. “I don’t know that the consumer could bear that kind of increase,” in water rates necessary to pay for the project, she said. “We’d have to have federal help of some sort” to make it affordable, said Lucas, of Mineral Ridge, who served in the Ohio House of Representatives from 1986 to 2000. “We would have to have it,” June Lucas, a former state representative, said of a direct pipe that could be built from Berlin to MVSD’s treatment plant, completely bypassing Meander Creek and Meander Reservoir. Army Corps of Engineers for a backup water supply from Berlin that could also be used in case of a drought.Ī backup water-supply pipe with an intake near the bottom of Berlin Reservoir in about 50 feet of water near the Berlin dam already runs to Meander Creek in Ellsworth Township at a point before the creek enters Meander Creek Reservoir. MVSD is now nearing completion of its contract negotiations with the U.S. “You definitely want to have backup sources,” Vigorito said. MVSD serves about 220,000 people in Niles, Youngstown and surrounding communities.
Vigorito said he revisited the issue after a Vindicator reporter inquired for a mid-July story about MVSD’s backup water-supply plan in case Meander Creek Reservoir would become unusable as a drinking water source due to an algae bloom. Vigorito said he not only reviewed the old plan, but asked MVSD’s consulting engineers for their estimates of what the project would cost today. When the idea was reconsidered in 1988, the estimated cost was $19 million, he said. “It may have been too expensive at that time,” he said, referring to the 1950s. “It would have been much cheaper for them to do it back then compared to the cost today,” observed Anthony Vigorito, MVSD chief engineer, who estimated today’s cost at $20 million or more. It was never put into effect because it would have cost about $3.7 million when it first was proposed. The backup plan calls for installation of a pump station and pipe to deliver Berlin Reservoir water directly to the district’s treatment plant. The chief engineer of the Mahoning Valley Sanitary District is revisiting a 1950s plan in case Meander Creek Reservoir would become contaminated and unusable.
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