Water study could delay commercial construction

LAKE GEORGE — The Village Board is expected to announce a moratorium on any new commercial property water hookups in the town outside of the village in order to conduct a 10- to 12-week water study.

The board will vote on the resolution at its December meeting. The moratorium is proposed for six months.

According to a news release from the village, the board hired C.T. Male Engineering to conduct a study of the village’s water system to evaluate options for the growing needs of the area.

Lake George Town Supervisor Dennis Dickinson said Richard Schermerhorn’s plans to develop housing at the former site of Water Slide World was a driving force in deciding to conduct the study.

“We’ve had some interest from developers for large water usage projects and the village has enough water, but they want to make sure they can get to the volume needed for these projects, so that prompted us to have the water study done,” Dickinson said.

While the town and village both operate water filtration plants, the town-operated facility in Diamond Point serves fewer than 100 residents with a well water system, while the village plant serves over 1,800 residents in the village and town with more than 1,400 water service connections.

Currently, the village water is pumped directly from Lake George by a pump station on Beach Road to a modern water filtration station on Ottawa Street and distributed throughout the system.

The village supplies users north to Hearthstone Park on Route 9N and south to Route 9L, as well as on the east side of the lake.

The village news release not only cited the plans for the old Water Slide World site, but also the recent conversion of the old Ramada Inn into residences and multiple other condo developments on Route 9L and Bloody Pond Road, as reasons to conduct the water study and explore options for services.

“Village officials are concerned that the current filtration plant will not be able to service the expected higher volume and have joined with the Town Board to finance the $43,000 study. The study is expected to take 12-14 weeks,” Tuesday’s release states.

The study is meant to examine the present capacity of the system, point out areas of concern or possible limitations and provide conceptual designs of improvement to continue to accept additional customers in the planned areas of development.

“We do not want to hinder growth in the town of Lake George,” village Mayor Bob Blais said. “We want to be able to service all customers that wish village water in the town-outside-village and at the same time maintain an adequate reserve for the village.”