North Cook News

At the April 3 Village of Skokie board meeting, the board approved a cost-sharing program between the village and residents to take the sting out of the state-mandate to replace all lead water service lines. 

The cost-sharing would be an incentive for property owners to replace those lead lines and do so in alignment with the village’s scheduled infrastructure improvements. This way, as the village digs up areas to work on water mains, residents can get their service lines replaced at the same time at a lower cost than doing it on their own. 

The funds for the program will come out of the village's capital and infrastructure improvement funds.

"This year (the line replacement is) included within the capital improvement project. So there’s a water main project that is scheduled to be completed this summer, and that has approximately (230 water mains, with 141 of them lead pipes.)" said John Lockerby, Village manager of Skokie.

The Skokie program has a $3000 cost for participating residents, which is half or less than half the estimated cost of replacing a service line. Residents can pay this amount up front or in $50 monthly payments for 15 years, with a 1% interest rate to the city.

Lockerby explained the village has a pre-existing loan program that allows residents to stay in their homes while getting required improvements and repairs done. He said that water main replacement is eligible under this program for further financial assistance.

Many municipalities in states requiring the replacement of lead water mains have created cost- sharing programs for these projects, tagging them onto their existing water infrastructure projects in the area to minimize construction and costs. They share the cost with the property owners, since the service lines are technically the residents' private property and are not under city authority.