The Larattas photograph County Executive Ryan McMahon, Deputy Town Supervisor Joe Bick, and County Legislator Cody Kelly announcing the $4 million for the project.

A neighborhood in the town of Clay that currently does not have clean water was awarded $4 million from the county towards public water infrastructure. The total cost to connect the community to public water infrastructure will cost an estimated $7.5 million. Deputy Supervisor Joe Bick said the town will be looking for grant funds to finish the project. 

County Executive Ryan McMahon made the announcement on Tuesday at the home of Jim Laratta, a long-time advocate for bringing public water to the community. Bick and Legislator Cody Kelly also spoke. Laratta has been fighting for water for several years, and credited Kelly for his support in bringing it to the community. 

“This neighborhood in the town of Clay and parts of the town of Cicero are the only parts of the community essentially right now that feel a negative impact from the [Micron] project,” said McMahon, adding that Syracuse and the rest of the county currently only saw upsides. “These folks, their lives are being impacted. So water is coming here first.” 

Residents in the community, which spans Caughdenoy Road, Fancher Road and Manhattan Drive, along the Oneida River, currently use well water. Residents told Central Current they cannot drink their water. Instead, they buy bottled water. 

Laratta has been dealing with water problems for 23 years. Initially, he hoped the community could “tag along” with funding for the Micron project to get public water. 

A test for the total dissolved solids in the Laratta’s water came back nearly ten times higher than normal reading for a house’s water, said Laratta. He said his neighbors had found chloroform, a carcinogen, in their water. 

Neighbors use treatments on their water, but it’s not enough. 

“You cannot drink the water,” said Danielle Schmidt, whose mother-in-law lives in the neighborhood. Her mother in law uses five-gallon water coolers for drinking and cooking. She runs her dishwasher twice per week, but she is lucky to get three years from one, Schmidt said. “The water is so terrible in this well, it actually eats the inside of the dishwasher.” 

Schmidt said her mother-in-law takes white clothes to the laundromat, as washing them in the existing water would stain them. The community members use water filters and UV lights, replacing their filters every three to four weeks. 

The community may also get sewers as the Oak Orchard Wastewater Treatment Center is updated, said McMahon. Currently, they use septic tanks. They worry that run-off from the tanks runs into the river, said Ted Vermette, a local resident. 

The announcement came as county legislators, including Kelly, are up for re-election. McMahon waved off concerns about the timing of the announcement and said the county had just now been able to secure funding. The money came from the Metropolitan Water Board Reserve, McMahon said. 

Some residents put up signs for Kelly after the meeting. Laratta said that Kelly had been instrumental in securing the funding, and had answered every email and text for years. Kelly said he’d been happy to represent his constituents and get the ball rolling. The town will now handle the implementation. 

He said there are also people near Route 31 who don’t have access to public water. He has had conversations with them as well, but said there has been less of an organized push from those residents. 

About 72 parcels of land will receive water, said Kelly. 

The timeline on the project has not been determined, as the town still needs to secure the rest of the $7.5 million project. 

“This is a project that will take a period of time, just like sewers will take a period of time, but that way this community will have infrastructure,” said McMahon. “They pay high property taxes having homes on the water, and the gripe is lack of public infrastructure. We’re fixing that.”

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Laura Robertson is a staff reporter covering Onondaga County. Prior to joining Central Current, she lived on the edge of the Bering Strait in Nome, Alaska, where she worked as a reporter for a year. She...