The City Council voted unanimously on second reading of an ordinance on Wednesday to authorize Mayor Ravi S. Bhalla to enter into a water service contract with SUEZ. The contract includes $33 million in water infrastructure upgrades over 15 years. A new public water utility managed by the City was also approved by the Council. With the final vote on the water contract, the new public water utility and contract will go into effect on July 1.
“I want to express my thanks to the City Council for unanimous approval of our new water contract and public water utility. Hoboken will finally be able to make critical upgrades to our water infrastructure with multi-million dollar investments that have been lacking for decades. While we won’t be able to solve all water main breaks overnight, this puts us well on our way to significantly upgrading our water system with six times more investments than currently required. Thank you again to City Directors Jen Gonzalez and Stephen Marks for leading the negotiations with SUEZ, to SUEZ for coming to the negotiating table, as well as the Council sub-committee on infrastructure.”
There will be no change for the process of a bill payment for the Hoboken ratepayer, as the bill will continued to be collected by SUEZ. However, those funds would be directed into the public water utility that will now be operated by the City of Hoboken, and the majority of funds will be invested by the City into proactive upgrades.
In addition to the $33 million for water infrastructure upgrades over 15 years, which includes an average of $2.2 million per year, an additional $2 million investment in smart technology to monitor water consumption is also required.
For more information on the SUEZ contract, visit https://www.hobokennj.gov/news/mayor-bhalla-announces-new-contract-with-suez-for-water-main-operations
