South Whitehall advances $6M sewer upgrade plan to meet state mandate

SOUTH WHITEHALL TWP., Pa. — South Whitehall Township’s planning commission weighed in Thursday on plans to improve municipal sewer infrastructure to comply with state regulations.

The commission offered no additional comments on the plan before unanimously voting to move it forward.

As with municipalities across Lehigh County, South Whitehall must improve its sewer infrastructure which ties into Kline’s Island wastewater treatment plant to comply with a state mandate.

Amid heavy rain in late 2018 and early 2019, more wastewater passed through Kline’s Island than the plant was permitted to handle.

As a result, state Department of Environmental Protection officials determined that the treatment plant violated state rules.

Pennsylvania regulations dictate that after a violation, municipalities that feed into the offending treatment system must make a plan to increase capacity and ensure the plant will not be overloaded in the future.

South Whitehall faces $6 million work

Overloads as a result of heavy rain are a sure sign that the sewer system is letting in water it is not designed to process.

To restore the sewer system, connected municipalities need to better seal their share of piping and infrastructure against outside water sources.

In all, improvements across the system are expected to cost more than $300 million, according to the Lehigh County Authority.

For its part, South Whitehall will need to undertake nearly $6 million in improvement projects through 2035. The township will not need to borrow money in the short term to fund the work.

Most of that work will focus on sealing, lining and raising manholes to keep out rain; South Whitehall has committed to sealing and raising all of its sewer manholes by 2033.

Township workers also will survey its part of the sewer system and look for pipes which need to be lined or replaced.