Great Barrington — On June 13, Housatonic Water Works (HWW) received a $350,000 grant from the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the state’s Department of Environmental Protection (MassDEP) for a manganese-removal project. The company received the funds through the Emerging Contaminants for Small or Disadvantaged Communities grant program funded by the Bipartisan Infrastructure Bill.
Following a Berkshire Edge request for information, a MassDEP representative sent multiple applications HWW made for the grant. In the grant applications, Company Treasurer James Mercer cited the installation of a green sand filtration system as the reason for the grant request.
In June 2023, the company filed an application with the state’s Department of Public Utilities requesting a 112.7 percent overall revenue increase. One of the primary reasons cited for the increase is the installation of the green sand filtration system.
In late April, the company filed a proposed settlement that would raise HWW customers rates by over 90 percent over the next five years.
In the applications, Mercer wrote that the project to install the green sand filtration system would start on December 1, 2024, and end on September 30, 2025. He estimates that the total project cost would be $1.67 million. “The company’s engineers evaluated different technologies to remediate the manganese issue and concluded that green sand filtration was the best alternative for our system,” Mercer wrote in the first application on March 26. “Following a successful year-long pilot study using this technology, the company now seeks to implement a full-scale green sand filtration system to solve the manganese problem. The project will include the construction of a new treatment facility to house the new treatment system and other improvements ancillary to its implementation.”
In a second application, dated March 28, Mercer wrote: “Since 2018 manganese has been detected year-round in the source, Long Pond, where periodic manganese spikes have reached as high as 0.34 mg/l (milligrams per liter) for both the raw and finished water. The company now seeks to implement a full-scale green sand filtration system to solve the manganese problem.”
Mercer added in both applications that the green sand filtration project would include “other improvements ancillary to its implementation”; however, he did not specify what those improvements would include.
In both applications, Mercer wrote that the company is eligible for the grant program because it serves a tract of Berkshire County that “is considered disadvantaged because it meets one burden threshold, low income, and the associated socioeconomic threshold.”
It is not known how the grant funds will impact the company’s current rate-increase request with the Department of Public Utilities.
At the Great Barrington Selectboard meeting on July 22, board members would not comment on the company receiving the grant.
Meanwhile, the Great Barrington Board of Health is scheduled to hold a special meeting on Wednesday, July 31. Listed on the meeting agenda is an executive session “to discuss strategy with respect to Housatonic Water Works Co. because an open discussion may have a detrimental effect on the litigation position of the Board of Health.”
At the previous Board of Health meeting, residents asked members of the board for more advocacy on behalf of HWW customers.
In response, Chair Michael Lanoue said: “The Board of Health is responsible for all health-related issues in Great Barrington. But the devil is always in the details. When you get into a public water supply, we are not the specific regulatory authority. To say that we are responsible for Housatonic Water Works customers—generally speaking, you could say that. But it comes down to specific regulatory language in the code. We are not the specific regulator for the water supply.”
Click here to view HWW’s grant application.
