Utilities Authority Breaks Ground on Franklin Lakes Sewer Project

The Northwest Bergen County Utilities Authority marked the start of a $5.2 million Franklin Lakes Business District Sanitary Sewer Project on Monday.

Officials including borough mayor Frank Bivona were on site at Susquehanna Avenue and Pulis Avenue to help the utilities company initiate its project, which is expected to take 15 to 18 months to complete.

"The project is viewed as historic for its safeguard of groundwater quality and elimination of environmental harm from the potential failure of aging septic systems," said NBCUA Spokesman Paul McEntyre in a press release. "Created as one of the region’s premier lakeside residential communities enhanced by an attractive array of recreational amenities, Franklin Lakes until now has relied on individual septic systems."

NBCUA commissioners and staff, headed by Chairman William Dator, hosted the event, with a number of other Franklin Lakes officials and representatives.

A major focus for this project is the elimination of six treatment plants and septic systems serving business, retail and school facilities, as well as some residential areas, according to McEntyre. Residences along the new sewer line route will also have access, but officials have made it clear there will be no mandatory ‘tie-ins’ unless required by law for failing systems, he said.

Upon completion, the system will initially carry 90,000 gallons of wastewater per day to NBCUA’s Waldwick plant for processing. Should Franklin Lakes dramatically expand that volume in the future, the NBCUA plant will still be well within its design limit, Dator has stated.

NBCUA was able to arrange construction loans through New Jersey Environmental Infrastructure Trust well below market rates at 1 percent. The authority was also successful in winning a $1.025 million loan forgiveness grant, almost 20 percent of the loan amount.

NBCUA was in the news recently when Bergen County Executive Kathleen Donovan  who allegedly refused to give up a $5,000 yearly stipend and full-time health benefits.

Dator, a Mahwah resident, and the other NBCUA commissioners who maintain oversight of a sewage treatment plant in Waldwick that serves 10 municipalities, argued that Donovan does not have the power to dismiss them and .

County Freeholders later appointed Wyckoff Mayor Chris DePhillips and former Mahwah Mayor John DaPuzzo to

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