Bringing Lake Michigan water to the Kendall communities of Montgomery, Oswego and Yorkville is estimated at $272 million. The Kendall communities are looking at loans and water-rate hikes as ways to finance the project. (Flickr photo)

(Editor’s note: This is the second of two parts looking at the effort to bring Lake Michigan water to Montgomery, Oswego and Yorkville)

Kendall County communities have the monumental task of running between 20 and 40 miles of pipes to get Lake Michigan water flowing into residents’ homes within four years.

Those communities also have the equally daunting task of paying for the region-changing project. Area residents will have to absorb at least some of those costs, according to local officials, as water rates are expected to more than double, and possibly triple, when Lake Michigan water gets flowing from their faucets.

“We are looking at ways to reduce costs. We are looking at configuring the lines in different ways, but at the end of the days, the costs have to be paid,” said Oswego Village President Ryan Kauffman.

Capital costs for running the pipeline to Montgomery, Oswego and Yorkville is estimated at $272 million.

Oswego will pick up $73 million of those costs, according to Kauffman, and shell out an additional

$136 million through 2050 in water costs.

“We are looking to pay for the water in several ways: loans, sewer and water capital funds, through

bills for consumers, connection fees for developers and real estate transfer taxes paid by home buyers,” Kauffman said.

He noted that the village is doing a study to determine what water rates should be set at to help meet the costs of the project. That study is expected to be finalized by the end of summer or early fall.

Kauffman said that village leaders understand that any rate hikes will impact individuals on fixed incomes. He noted that there is a potential for tiered water rates in the village.

“Over time, we anticipate a 200 percent increase in water rates,” Kauffman said.

Lake Michigan water could be flowing into Oswego and Yorkville as soon as 2027. Montgomery

residents may not taste Lake Michigan water for five years after that as water main replacements have to be done to ensure the village’s pipe leak rate is low enough to meet requirements of the DuPage Water Commission, the entity supplying the water to Kendall commmunities.

Yorkville City Administrator Bart Olson said his community expects to finance the majority of its share of the project through a low-interest federal loan.

Through the Water Infrastructure Finance and Innovation Act of 2014, communities can tap into a

federal credit program, administered by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, for eligible water and wastewater infrastructure projects. It provides loans at rates lower than communities would get at a bank.

Olson noted that Yorkville is eligible to finance 80 percent of the Lake Michigan water project costs through the WIFIA funding option. Because they are larger communities, Montgomery and Oswego can only use WIFIA for up to 49 percent of their project costs.

The Yorkville city administrator said “overall community affordabilty” is something officials continue to keep in mind when discussing the project.

“Water bills average $45 per month in Yorkville. We are looking at average bills being $90 or $95 as soon as 2030,” Olson said. “And there is no profit on it. We are not taking a share. It is just the cost necessary to bring water to the community.”

Until bills come out with the Lake Michigan water charges attached, it is hard to know what the push back from residents will be, Olson surmised.

“We hope it is affordable. We are going to do all we can to make that happen,” Olson said. “We want to make sure water is affordable for everybody.”