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City officials say a major obstacle to eradicating lead from Pittsburgh's drinking water: Most homeowners can't afford to replace their aging, lead-laden pipes.
As part of a plan announced Friday, Mayor Bill Peduto said he wants to find a private partner willing to do it for them.
The goal is to find a private company to acquire part ownership in the Pittsburgh Water and Sewer Authority in exchange for committing to invest in the cash-strapped authority's infrastructure, Kevin Acklin, chief of staff to Peduto, told the Tribune-Review.
Acklin said the commitment should include a willingness by that partner to replace residential service lines — underground pipes running from buildings to water mains. Under state law, the authority cannot spend money on private lines, Acklin said.
The Peduto administration early Friday issued a request for proposals from teams with financial and legal expertise to devise long-term strategies for improving PWSA's operations, customer service and value as a public asset.
At a news conference Thursday, Peduto lamented that “after well over a decade of disinvestment” in PWSA, “We may have lost the asset.”
The authority has so much debt — approaching $1 billion — that 50 cents of every $1 billed to customers gets spent toward paying it off, Peduto has said.
Yet the notion of even partially privatizing PWSA rattled some observers.
Allegheny County Controller Chelsa Wagner accused the Peduto administration of continuing “to duck and hide in the face of our water crisis.” She slammed Peduto's approach of bringing on a private partner as “dead wrong.”
“Privatization of our public water utility — which the mayor tried to mask in today's proposal as a public-private partnership — will result in lower health and environmental standards and increased customer rates,” Wagner said.
As for replacing private service lines, Wagner spokesman Lou Takacs said the controller “doesn't feel that privatization is necessary to accomplish that particular goal.”
Peduto clarified that although he called for “a full financial and operations partner,” the city does not want to hand over full control to a private vendor.
PWSA hired Boston-based Veolia Inc. to manage the utility between 2012 and 2015 but in October sued the company for $12.5 million, claiming it created problems that led to state violations.
PWSA's restructuring model could involve taking on private and public partners to expand its water service delivery or water credits to areas outside of Pittsburgh because the authority has more water than it needs to serve residents, Acklin said. Such an expansion would involve collaboration — and potentially consolidations or mergers — with other municipal water and sewer authorities.
“Every city that is dealing with an aging water infrastructure is considering these issues,” Acklin said. “Scranton recently went through with a proposal, I believe an outright sale to a private operator. Allentown did another proposal where they were able to merge with another utility.”
PWSA's board and executive staff issued a statement expressing support for Peduto's initiative.
Talks about seeking partners to improve PWSA have been going on for about six months, Acklin said, and the flush and boil order lifted Thursday that affected more than 100,000 customers this week reaffirmed the urgency to find them.
“The public is dealing with the billing issues and the lead issues as well as having a boil order issued,” said Acklin. “We wanted to show clearly that we are not going to turn away from these problems; we're going to address them head on.”
On Thursday, PWSA interim Executive Director Bernard. L. Lindstrom, who took the helm in September, described the authority as being at an “all-time low” in terms of not only staff and customer morale but also capabilities.
Proposals for restructuring PWSA are due Feb. 24, and city officials will aim to choose one by the end of the month, Acklin said.
In the meantime, homeowners who suspect they have a lead problem should let their faucets run for a minute before using or drinking water, which should help to flush any loose lead particulates, Acklin said.
“It's good advice just to flush your waters,” said Acklin, who lives in Squirrel Hill, among the areas that were affected by the flush and boil order. “I've been doing it for years.”
Natasha Lindstrom is a Tribune-Review staff writer. Reach her at 412-380-8514 or nlindstrom@tribweb.com. Staff writer Theresa Clift contributed.
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