Archive: Opinions

If desirable planned development is the Christmas present any municipality would want, sewer is the Grinch.  The Town of Lansing has been trying to build a viable municipal sewer project since around 1960, but several heroic efforts to craft practical plans have failed, largely due to high cost.  The last major effort failed in 2013.  It was so costly, plus would have required property owners who may never be able to hook up to the sewer to pay.  A poll found 59% of Lansing taxpayers did not want to pay for it.

It looks like a three-municipality agreement is about to foil the Grinch.  The current plan is quite limited.  It will bring sewer to eight properties, including two new large developments that have not yet broken ground.  But it gets the sewer's foot in the door, which may open into a full, or at least expanded Town sewer at some time in the future.

Town and Village of Lansing and Village of Cayuga Heights officials have lauded their agreement as an example of municipal cooperation and shared services at its best.After periods of squabbling between the Lansings -- a rather major squabble was the cause of the formation of the Village in the first place -- this agreement does herald better times.  But unlike the declarations from Albany that their programs citizens are helping citizens when, in fact, they hurt, this three-municipality agreement will be good for real people.  The cherry on top is that it will also be good for the environment.

In talking with village and town officials it has struck me that they made a conscious effort to be gracious to one another, and that led to finding a mutually beneficial solution to a long standing problem.  Once the core idea was agreed upon they built on it with the result that more people will benefit.

The original plan was to bring sewer from the Village up Triphammer Road to the Cayuga Orchards project just south of Asbury Road.  A pipe would be extended westward to two other projects.  As talks progressed the location was moved to East Shore Drive, which not only reduced the number of easements that would need to be obtained, but also made it possible to add new sewer to a section of the Village that isn't currently served.  The Town gets sewer it has wanted for over half a century, the Village gets some revenue for passing the Town's effluent along to the processing plant in Cayuga Heights, as well as new sewer for some of its residents, and Cayuga Heights gets more revenue that will surely help upgrade their aging plant.

Part of what makes it possible is that the developers are willing to pay for it.  That brings the cost of the initial construction down to zero public money.  But it also makes their developments possible more affordably and manageably than building and maintaining their own private plants would be.  There is also this: a single municipally managed sewer system is less likely to dump poop into Cayuga lake than a myriad of private package plants and septic systems.

If this plan succeeds it may also facilitate an expansion of the plant at some point in the future so that sewer can affordably expand to more of the Town.

You don't often see good news stories like this where government officials come together to make truly beneficial things happen.  In our difficult times of politicians blaming each other, tweeting accusations, and the escalating political split that plagues our country, it almost seems unbelievable that three governments can actually make something good happen.  But they did.

Take that, Sewer Grinch!

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