Phoenicia without a paddle

A story in the Woodstock Times (Without a paddle: City pulls the plug on Phoenicia sewer), details the fate of the funds NYC had set aside for Phoenicia.


The New York City Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) has withdrawn its participation in the proposed Phoenicia sewer project, rejecting the Shandaken Town Board’s request for an extension of the deadline to establish a local sewer district. In a letter to Shandaken supervisor Rob Stanley, dated June 1, DEP commissioner Carter H. Strickland, Jr., stated that the $15.8 million block grant that has been reserved for the Phoenicia sewer for the past 15 years will be released to other towns, and that the Catskill Watershed Corporation (CWC) “intends to terminate its contract” with Shandaken.

In his letter to the town, Strickland noted that the city has spent $1.9 million over the past 15 years to study and design a wastewater treatment plant for Phoenicia, granting several timeframe extensions, as the community considered various options.

“However,” he wrote, “with many missed milestones for action by the Town of Shandaken, it has now become clear that the community is not prepared to take the concrete steps necessary to advance a project to completion…While we view this outcome as unfortunate, DEP can no longer justify reserving funds for a wastewater treament plant (WWTP) for Phoenicia.”
The letter concludes with an expression of willingness to continue working with the town on “stream restoration projects, our septic program, and enforcement of watershed regulations.”

As pointed out in the DEP letter, New York City has built similar systems at its expense in Hunter, Fleischmanns, Windham, Andes, Roxbury, Prattsville and Pine Hill. The latest one began operations last year in Boiceville.

Watershed acquisition program

A story appeared in The Daily Mail, a Greene County newspaper, that might be of interest.


Watershed stakeholders issue new land acquisition program

Document would extend DEP authority through 2022

By Jim Planck - Hudson-Catskill Newspapers - Published: Friday, June 18, 2010 2:13 AM EDT

New York City’s land acquisition program in its Catskill Mountains watershed region — officially known as the West of Hudson Watershed — has been one of the Big Apple’s shining stars for water quality protection since its inception in 1997.

Click on the headline of this post for the full story.