>Comments made by incumbent Councilman Jacques Harlow during last week’s League of Women Voters candidates’ forum, and repeated in part during Wednesday evening’s Village Council Work Session, suggest that Village officials may soon try to jettison the Ridgewood Water utility and/or the Ridgewood Waste Water Treatment Plant.
Citing the complexities of managing relatively low volume operations while being faced with increasingly complex, stringent, and expensive to implement regulatory agency demands, Harlow suggested Village Council members may soon be faced with deciding whether to sell off both Village of Ridgewood owned & operated service functions.
Likely bidder for the water utility operations would be United Water of Harrington Park (an interconnection between Ridgewood Water and United Water already exists). Either the Northwest Bergen Utilities Authority in Waldwick, or Bergen County Utilities Authority in Little Ferry would be candidates for assuming control over the Waste Water Treatment Plant.
Since Ridgewood Water and sewer also services subscribers in Glen Rock, Midland Park, and Wyckoff, it is possible that the governing bodies of those municipalities would each need to approve any change of ownership.
Cash obtained from the sale of one or both operations could be used to pay off municipal debt and fund new capital projects/property purchases. The Ridgewood school district would NOT be entitled to any portions of the proceeds.
Ridgewood Water currently employs 36 full-time workers. The Waste Water Treatment Plant has 13 full-time employees. It is expected that some job losses would be associated with the disposal of either operation.