As a U.S. senator, Bob Casey is used to making appearances in towns and greeting local officials in celebration of federal funds he helped secure for economic development or civic improvements.
But Casey, D-Pa., said occasions like Tuesday in Bradford, when city and McKean County officials were on hand for the formal announcement of a $1.5 million federal grant for the Bradford City Water Authority to rehabilitate its 24-inch transmission main, are often what he enjoys the most.
The project will upgrade a line that was installed in 1955 with new gate valves meant to ensure that the catastrophic rupture of Feb. 23, 2015, which affected water service for days in Bradford, won’t have the same prolonged negative impact on households and businesses.
Casey, speaking on the hillside overlooking the 3.5 million gallon Reservoir No. 4 at the end of Prospect Street, indicated that the funding is meant to ensure something as fundamental as families being able to turn on water taps in their homes.
“I know some people gathered here today … actually did the work” to repair that 2015 rupture, “and they understand what a million and a half dollars will mean for this project and what it means for the people of Bradford and what it means for those who rely upon clean drinking water,” he said.
The senator noted a state constitutional amendment adopted in 1971 simply states: “The people have a right to clean air, pure water and to the preservation of the natural, scenic, historic and aesthetic values of the environment.”
With that passage in mind, Casey said projects like the Bradford main water line improvements make the most sense when requests for funding from city and county leaders come to Washington. He noted that he teamed with fellow U.S. Sen. John Fetterman, D-Pa., and U.S. Rep. Glenn Thompson, R-Pa., to usher the grant request through the review process.
Mayor Tom Riel, who introduced Casey, and Steve Disney, executive director of the Bradford City Water Authority, thanked the senator for his efforts on the grant petition.
Disney noted the $1.5 million will enable the authority to install a series of gate valves all along the 5.5-mile route of the original 24-inch transmission main, providing means to quickly shut down a segment of the main line — and connecting lines — to prevent massive loss of water in the system.
Disney said all new gate valves will be pinpointed on the authority’s GIS mapping, which will allow for quick locating of each valve in an emergency. All new valves will also be routinely “exercised” to ensure they all stay in good operational condition.
With several workers and staff of the water authority looking on, Disney recounted the water emergency that resulted from the February 2015 main break. Because of the magnitude of the break and the lack of operational gate valves, the stored 5.5 million gallons of water drained away in less than two hours.
“Flow rates out of the break were estimated at over 30,000 gallons per minute,” he said, later adding, “And, by the way, it was 22 degrees below zero.”
Disney expressed gratitude for the community, state agencies and especially the water authority employees for their “heroic efforts” during the state of emergency.
“Since that time we have been implementing countermeasures such as installing remotely operated valves at Reservoir 4 and our Kendall Avenue tank that can be closed or throttled back, to salvage the stored water at these facilities in the event of a catastrophic water main break,” Disney said.
The authority also installed a 24-inch insertion-style valve on Center Street just below School Street, while it implemented a $13 million dollar project utilizing low-interest loans through PENNVEST in 2020 to install a second 24-inch transmission main from the water treatment plant feeding directly into Reservoir 4.
Meanwhile, Ron Orris, chairman of the water authority board, and McKean County commissioners Tom Kreiner, Carol Duffy and Marty Wilder took the opportunity to ask for support from Casey for further improvements of the Bradford area’s water system. A project to replace water meters in the area is estimated at $3.5 million while upgrades at the water treatment plant (at the end of West Corydon Street) built in the 1980s are estimated at $8 million to $10 million.
Orris and Disney also explained that local officials and residents in Cyclone, Gifford and Rew are eager to someday have Bradford City Water Authority service extended there, with cost estimates at $22 million to $25 million. They indicated that many wells in that area have poor quality water and, in Cyclone, there is concern about the planned injection well for hydraulic fracturing wastewater.
“The system has the water capacity to serve those areas,” Disney said.
“But getting there is going to take some doing,” Orris added.
Casey was in McKean County on the same day that the state’s other U.S. senator, John Fetterman, made a stop to address supporters in Port Allegany. Political watchers in the area could not cite whether the Keystone State’s two senators had ever been in the county for separate events on the same day.
