Town of Waukesha demanding too much water, city says

Feb. 12, 2013
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By Don Behm of the Journal Sentinel

Feb. 12, 2013 0

The Town of Waukesha is demanding too much water from the City of Waukesha as a condition for participating in a proposed future water service area, a critical boundary in Waukesha's request for Lake Michigan water, City Administrator Ed Henschel said Tuesday.

The service area and projections of water demand must be resolved before state environmental officials can determine whether the city's application complies with a Great Lakes protection compact.

In a letter emailed Tuesday to Town Chairman Angie Van Scyoc, Henschel says a recent decision to include a northern portion of the town in the city's service area was flawed and needs to be reconsidered.

At a Jan. 24 meeting, the Town Board finished drawing lines on a map and came up with a northern portion of the town that was to be included in the city's water service area for the application. The map generally encompassed town properties west of Springdale Road, north of Racine Ave. and state Highway 59, and east of county Highway TT and Merrill Hills Road.

The Town Board's resolution demanded not less than 0.55 million gallons a day for the area by midcentury.

Henschel's letter describes the volume as "inappropriate and excessive."

Even if fully developed by that time, this small portion of the town would not need that much water, Waukesha Water Utility General Manager Dan Duchniak said Tuesday.

"The town wants to be sure the allocation is a sufficient amount for the population of the area," Van Scyoc said Tuesday.

Town officials have not been provided with any information showing why the city believes the volume is excessive, according to Van Scyoc.

"We would ask the city to show us the calculations, and what population it is based on," she said.

A revised water demand estimate for the entire town at midcentury is an average of 1.42 million gallons a day, Duchniak said.

Van Scyoc and other town officials did not ask the city for demand projections for the smaller area before adopting the resolution, according to Duchniak. The 0.55 million gallons a day volume came from an earlier demand estimate for the full town that was found to be in error.

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About Don Behm

Don Behm reports on Milwaukee County government, Milwaukee Metropolitan Sewerage District, the environment and communities in southeastern Wisconsin. He has won reporting awards for investigations of Great Lakes water pollution, Milwaukee's cryptosporidiosis outbreak, and the deaths of three sewer construction workers in a Menomonee Valley methane explosion.

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