Berkshire County — On February 5, the Town of Stockbridge filed a motion with the Department of Public Works (DPU) requesting that Housatonic Water Works reverse its planned rate increases.
The town also requests that the DPU investigate the long-troubled utility.
The motion is in response to HWW delaying installing a manganese filtration system, which is part of a rate increase plan approved by the DPU in July.
As part of the plan, HWW customer rates would increase by over 90 percent over five years.
On Friday, Feb. 14, Great Barrington officially joined with Stockbridge’s motion calling for the DPU to roll back the planned rate increases, and for an investigation into the company.
When HWW filed its notification of a delay in the manganese filtration project on January 24 with the DPU, company attorneys squarely blamed Great Barrington’s Board of Health’s Order to Correct, issued against the company on August 22, 2024, for the delay.
Great Barrington Town Counsel David Doneski, an attorney from Boston law firm KP Law P.C., filed the Notice of Joinder with the DPU on Friday, Feb. 14.
In the filing, Doneski writes:
On October 8, 2024, the DEP [Massachusetts Department of Environmental Protection] issued a Unilateral Administrative Order [UAO] to the company requiring the permitting and construction of filtration upgrades designed to remove manganese from the company’s Long Pond supply source. The DEP issued a permit approving the filtration upgrades on December 13, 2024.
Before the department, the company touted the green sand filtration system as the way to address water quality concerns. Indeed, in the order approving the Settlement Agreement the Department noted: “The company opines that, based on test data and analysis by its engineers and consultants, the primary source of discoloration is the presence of manganese at Long Pond.” The order stated that it was expected that the filtration system would be in service by the fourth quarter of 2024, and called out “the goal of providing higher quality water and improved service at the lowest possible cost.” It also acknowledged customer concerns, as expressed in comments to the department, regarding potential exposure to contaminated water; the burden of living with the constant concern of exposure to manganese (as well as HAA5 and chlorine); and problems performing daily tasks as a result of discolored water.
Despite all this background, with an obvious focus on the green sand filtration system and the company’s firm reliance on that system as the solution to the brown water problems for which the Board of Health was attempting to provide a measure of relief, the company did not inform the Board of Health, or any officials of Great Barrington, of the financing impediment it has asserted until the Notice of Delay filed with the Department on January 24, 2025.
