Newtown Sewer Authority Votes To Stop All Work On Treatment Plant

NEWTOWN BOROUGH, PA — The Newtown, Bucks County Joint Municipal Authority on Tuesday voted 3 to 2 to stop all work on a proposed wastewater treatment plant planned for a 17.5-acre site on Lower Silver Lake Road along the township’s southern border with Middletown Township,

The three township representatives on the board - authority chairman Jerry Schenkman, Elen Snyder and Linda Bobrin - voted for the motion. Borough representatives Chris Gusty and Bob Walker voted against the motion. Member Christine Sciarrotta did not attend the meeting.

Walker had asked that a counter motion be considered that would have placed a public referendum on the ballot seeking the approval or disapproval of the Newtown community on the merits of a wastewater treatment plant.

Sewer authority member Bob Walker proposes a counter motion to take the question of a wastewater treatment plant to the voters. (Jeff Werner/Patch)

Chairman Jerry Schenkman makes a point while member Elen Snyder looks on.

“We have a responsibility to 9,000 ratepayers and while I appreciate all the comments you shared with us, I don’t personally feel I have a sense of how our ratepayers feel about this project,” he told a large contingent of mostly Middletown residents in attendance at the meeting.

Gusty agreed, saying it was “premature to stop work on the project.”

Walker, however, withdrew his counter motion after the motion to stop all work on the treatment plant passed.

Elen Snyder, who made the motion to stop the process, said the proposed wastewater treatment plant was a way to address the lack of sewer capacity in the township and the borough.

“There is no way Newtown Borough and Newtown Township can thrive by having more business because we can’t give them access to the sanitary sewer system,” she said. “We were trying to come up with something we could do to stop that and this was the best option that we found. Apparently, folks don’t like it, so my motion right now is to stop all work on the project and see what can be done by the township to acquire the land for other purposes.”

Schenkman struggled with the decision, citing the concerns of Middletown residents with the location of the plant and the technology available that hasn't advanced to the point to ensure there will be no odors emanating from the plant.

“On the other hand, the idea of giving back the land for 250 apartments is not a solution that I relish. I’m very concerned about that. I know Newtown Township has been fighting that for quite some time and may go back to that if we can’t find a solution,” he said. “I’m most concerned about triggering a process that we lose control over what’s happening with the land. I don’t want the sewer plant there but I also don’t want 250 apartments there.”

Before the vote, residents had plenty to say about the proposed treatment plant and vowed to fight the authority if it decided to continue with the process.

Many of the speakers raised concerns about the impact the plant would have on their property values and quality of life. Others raised concerns about potential impacts on Core Creek Park and the local environment.

Newtown Borough resident Tara Grunde McLaughlin broke with the crowd, voicing support for the project and challenging Middletown residents who have characterized the proposed plant as having a "ring of stink" around it.

"This is not the sewer plant that you went to on your third-grade trip," she said. "If they go forward with this and use this high-tech, modern membrane system, all you will see set back on the land is an enclosed building. Everything will be enclosed. There's no smell. There are no open tanks. There's been a lot of misinformation out there about the smell."

She continued, "We send our wastewater to Philadelphia. We rely on them to do it and we are at their behest if they decide to start charging us more. And we can't say anything about it. I would propose that we continue with this plan because we are future-proofing our community. This is a plan for the future, and I strongly support the sewer authority doing this."

The authority's decision comes weeks after the Newtown Township Board of Supervisors bowed to mounting public pressure and voted to send a letter to the authority asking it to cancel the project.

The decision puts to rest for now plans to build a state-of-the-art water treatment plant that authority members had said would have allowed Newtown to chart its own destiny in terms of
future rate hikes and the allowance of EDUs.

This 17.5-acre property on Lower Silver Lake Road is where the authority proposed to build a new wastewater treatment plant.

The large contingent of mostly Middletown Township residents who attended Tuesday’s meeting greeted the motion with applause but also with skepticism.

After the meeting, resident Bill Everett stopped short of calling the motion by the board a victory. Instead, he called it “a step” forward and vowed to continue their opposition to the project. The residents had asked the board to change the wording of its motion to cancel, an idea Schenkman resisted saying by doing that the authority would have given up its rights to the land and opened it up to 250 apartments.

The authority, which serves 9,000 sanitary sewer customers in Newtown Township and Newtown Borough, said its decision to explore building its own plant was prompted by a move in 2022 by Bucks County Water and Sewer to sell its wastewater system to Aqua Pennsylvania for $1.1 billion. And the fact that neighboring towns that have sold to for-profit companies have seen skyrocketing water and sewer rate increases, the authority said.

While the BCWSA sale did not move forward, the authority said BCWSA is left “saddled with a laundry list of expensive upgrades and maintenance that will need to be done, including a multi-million-dollar infrastructure upgrade and maintenance to the Neshaminy Interceptor system.

“As a wholesale customer of BCWSA, our authority must contribute shared costs,” the authority said. “Our board realized that unless we took steps to become independent of the Bucks County Water and Sewer Authority, we would be subject to their decisions and rate hikes, subjecting our customers to higher expenses that we could not control. We decided to investigate the possibility of taking full dominion over our future sewer needs by building our own plant.

“As a wholesale customer of BCWSA, future spiraling rates would have had a trickle down effect on our customers,” the authority said