Howell will study cost

of Rte. 9 sewer plan

Council vote gives

the go-ahead to

feasibility report

By kathy baratta

Staff Writer

A feasibility and cost study that is needed to move ahead on the possible installation of sewers along How-ell’s southern portion of Route 9 has been approved by the Town-ship Council.

The proposal received a 4-0 approval by the governing body at Monday’s council meeting following a presentation coordinated by Howell’s Economic Development Coordinator Barry Lefkowitz and the Economic Development Com-mittee (EDC), which has been working on the sewer project for more than three years, according to EDC member Peter Tobasco.

Reached after the meeting, Lefkowitz told Greater Media Newspapers that with this vote, "the township is showing it is ready to move forward."

The sewer installations as proposed would run as follows:

• from the northern end of Route 9, the sewer line would run from Lanes Mill Road south, then turn and run east on Alexander Avenue to Randolph Road, where it would tie into an existing trunk line on Oak Glen Road.

• From the southern end of Route 9, the sewer line would start at the Regent Diner and run north to Alexander Avenue and then follow the previously detailed course to Oak Glen Road.

"This is an exciting opportunity for Howell to move forward," Lefkowitz said, noting that with the installation of sewers along this stretch of Route 9, the township "could finally compete with area towns in attracting good, clean ratables."

This would include towns like neighboring Freehold Township, Lefkowitz said, where commercial ratables make up 30.6 percent of the community’s tax base.

Previous information provided by the Howell EDC indicate that commercial ratables make up about 11 percent of Howell’s tax base.

Freehold Township municipal administrator Thomas Antus was among the speakers at Monday night’s presentation.

Lefkowitz said, "It’s a sad commentary for Howell that business owners have to tell customers they are not able to use the bathrooms in the afternoons because it rained that morning or that business owners have to continue to pay continually rising costs to keep the existing septic systems operating as well as possible."

He also said that by not installing sewers, Howell would be exposing itself to lawsuits due to the danger of leaching of septic fields into the Metedeconk River watershed.

Lefkowitz said the problems attendant with these septic systems are contrary with current state Department of Environmen-tal Protection (DEP) restrictions that now prevent buildings larger than 16,000 square feet from operating on septic systems.

He said the DEP restriction affects current business owners who, while they are "grandfathered" into the operation of their current septic systems, cannot sell to a buyer who will have a large customer volume projection.

Also, with Howell school administrators proposing the construction of three new schools at a cost of $46 million, Lefkowitz said the issue of attracting commercial ratables is more important now than ever.

"The only way we can bring in good, clean ratables ... is by having sewer service," Lefkowitz said, adding, "sewer lines attract businesses."

With Monday night’s vote, Lefkowitz said he would be able to aggressively pursue a proposal from a medical group to construct a 70,000-square-feet medical services office on Route 9 near Lanes Mill Road.

Lefkowitz noted that taxpayers would not be absorbing any of the costs of the sewer line installations and tie-ins because the costs would be directly billed to the property owners, most of whom are business owners.

He said one way of mitigating the tie-in costs to the business owners would be to offer low-cost or low-interest financing that could be stretched over a 10-year period, as suggested by Antus in explaining how Freehold Township accomplished the same goal.

Regarding the concern expressed by some people of increased residential development in the areas of the proposed sewer line installations, Tobasco noted that much of the Randolph Road-Oak Glen Road area consists of wetlands. He said this will help curtail residential development in the area, as will the prohibitive costs a developer would incur in trying to tie into a forced main system.

He did, however, acknowledge that "there is no way to prevent some residential development" in the area where the sewer lines are proposed.

Tobasco maintains that if the sewer installations are done now, Howell will be able to share the cost not only with the affected business owners, but with the Manasquan River Regional Sewerage Authority (MRRSA), and the Fountains, a state Council On Affordable Housing development which has already started the process of building a sewer line between Estelle Lane and Alexander Avenue on the east side of Route 9 north.

If done now, Tobasco said, the sewer installation costs would be between $3 million and $4 million. He said the Fountains would kick in $1.1 million to $1.2 million and the township and the MRRSA would pay about $1.5 million to $2 million.

Mayor Timothy J. Konopka told Greater Media Newspapers the next phase following the feasibility study will be a public hearing and vote by the 78 property owners along the 7,000-foot stretch of Route 9 between Lanes Mill Road and the Lakewood border as to whether they want the sewers installed. The mayor said the vote by the property owners is "a formality that is expected to be approved due to the benefit this will be to these property owners."