Brookfield is likely to end its policy of reimbursing residents who choose to replace lead service lines at their homes before the village does.
At the village board’s July 8 committee of the whole meeting, Assistant Village Manager Stevie Ferrari spoke to trustees about a recommendation from village staff to end the reimbursement program due to issues they have seen crop up since the policy was implemented last August.
The policy allows Brookfield homeowners who had contractors replace lead service lines running under their homes to request reimbursement from the village for the full cost of the work. Ferrari said the village does not reimburse residents for other costs related to the line replacement, like required upgrades to the service lines, the installation of new water meters or interior restoration work.
“So, if flooring or drywall had to be breached, for example, we would not reimburse for the cost of new drywall and flooring,” she said.
She said that Brookfield does cover the costs to replace water service lines if there is a leak, even if the leak is on the private side of the line.
While the village board agreed to have staff bring forth an ordinance that would eliminate the policy at the board’s next meeting, the policy will remain on the books until trustees take their vote at that meeting.
Brookfield has been required to replace all lead service lines in town by the Lead Service Line Replacement and Notification Act since 2022. The Act specifies that municipalities must start replacing the lines by 2027 and complete the project by 2044, but Brookfield is already well ahead of schedule.
“We are currently very proactive in approaching replacements of these lines,” Ferrari said at the meeting. “While the state mandates this to be completed in a 17-year period, going at this rate, and most especially because we are on the [Illinois Environmental Protection Agency’s] intended funding list for next year, we may have all lead water services replaced within five years.”
According to village documents, Brookfield expects to receive $10 million in no-interest, 30-year loans from the IEPA next year for lead service line replacements. The IEPA is lending the village up to $7.15 million without interest for its replacements this year.
The reimbursements come out of the village’s lead service line replacement fund, which has been funded by a small portion of each resident’s water bill since the village hiked water rates by 14% in 2022 for that purpose. As of July 1, when Brookfield’s water rate increase for 2024 went into effect, residents pay $16.10 per thousand gallons of water, and $1.66 from that amount goes into the fund. At the meeting, Ferrari said the fund each year accrues about $750,000 while paying out between $250,000-$300,000 toward the village’s debt obligation from its IEPA loans.
To date, Ferrari said the village has reimbursed nine homeowners who elected to replace their private lead service lines at a total cost of $78,023. She said there are now four pending requests for reimbursements, adding up to about $51,000 based on the quotes from contractors that the four homeowners have submitted to the village.
After surveying six municipalities near Brookfield, Ferrari said village staff found that LaGrange, LaGrange Park, North Riverside, Riverside, Westchester and Western Springs have no similar policy.
“Brookfield is the only community allowing elected private line replacement at all, and then, ours is with 100% reimbursement,” Ferrari said. “The only community that had indicated they would potentially be looking at elected private line [replacement] is Western Springs. They currently have an overhead sewer cost-share program, similar to our flood mitigation program,” with a 50% cost-share cap that an elected line replacement policy in Western Springs could mirror.
Oak Park, which Brookfield staff did not survey, implemented an income-based reimbursement policy in March.
Ferrari said village staff have noticed three main issues with the reimbursement policy since Brookfield implemented it 11 months ago.
Dealing with solicitors
The first issue she raised is that local contractors have begun soliciting residents to have them replace lead service lines at their property on the village’s dime, some of whom have taken advantage of the fact that the policy does not require residents to seek quotes from multiple contractors.
“We did not see the high contractor quotes at the beginning of this program, and now that private contractors are realizing the village has a reimbursement program, we are getting residents calling [to say] a plumber or their plumber contacted them to let them know they should do this now because the village will pay 100% of it,” Ferrari said. “We’re seeing quotes ranging from [$]8,000, which is a little more typical, all the way up through [$]18,000 recently for line replacement.”
According to village documents, Brookfield is paying about $7,300 per lead service line replaced this year due to bulk pricing secured in the competitive bid process. Brookfield partnered with Five Star Energy Services, a contractor based in Waukesha, Wisconsin, in May for this year’s replacement project, which is expected to see 690 lead water services — nearly 25% of identified lines in town — replaced by the end of the year.
Finishing full replacements
The second issue that Ferrari said staff had encountered has to do with the state mandate that requires Brookfield to replace lead service lines. According to the Act, the village must replace the public side of a lead service line within 30 days of the private side being replaced, even if the homeowner does not ask for reimbursement from the village.
“We are mandated by state law to replace the public side if that side is determined to be lead as well, so if you touch either side of that line, public or private, you need to do a full replacement,” she said. “The unknown in public-side material verification does require hydro excavating down at the B-box. That is the only true way to, as close to 100% accuracy, identify the line material. That does take staff coordination; that does take staff costs.”
A B-box is a valve that connects a building’s private water service lines to the public water main at the edge of the property. Hydro excavation is a process through which the village or another contractor can use pressurized water to cut through soil and remove it in order to access the water service line buried underground.
According to village documents, when a resident replaces their private line electively and the village must replace the public side within 30 days, “[W]ater is reinstated with the partial water service replacement, and the consumers within the building have a potentially increased level of exposure to lead” until the village can replace the public side.
Coordinating staff
The third issue with the policy, Ferrari said, is that village has had to have staff set aside time on-the-clock to work on replacing the public sides of lines that were partially replaced while also managing the planned replacements for this year.
“Having to coordinate elective replacements outside of this large capital improvement project does take some time and can create some prolonged frustration for a private resident if they want to move forward with an elective replacement. We do need to project manage that, pull staff from project schedules to hydro excavate [and] determine public material, and that can create some delays,” Ferrari said.
“Additionally, depending on at what stage they notify the village of their replacement, it may require us contracting their procured contractor at a higher rate, as we would be unable to use Five Star Energy, for example, who are already on precured, low-bid rates,” she added.
Possible solutions
At the meeting, Ferrari presented trustees with five options to modify the policy to address some of staff’s issues without getting rid of it, though she said the board could choose to keep the policy as-is or pursue another path forward outside of those options.
Staff’s recommendation, she said, was to eliminate the reimbursement policy entirely.
The first option would require residents to submit multiple quotes from contractors before they select one and proceed with the replacement.
The second option would give Brookfield the power to choose the vendors for elective private replacements.
The third option would instate a maximum cap for the village’s share of the cost; for example, the village could cover 50% of costs up to $4,000, leaving a resident on the hook for the rest.
The fourth option would involve sending public works staff to check whether the public side of a line contains lead before a contractor replaces the private side.
The fifth option would require homeowners to pay a fee to the village if public works staff have to check the public side of a service line at all following an elective replacement.
After discussing the possibilities, village trustees agreed with staff’s recommendation to end the policy outright.
“I’d like to say that I support staff’s recommendation,” Trustee Jennifer Hendricks said. “I say that as a person who has a lead service line running to my home, and we’re likely to be one of the last ones replaced, based on the age of our street. I am confident that this is the most responsible and efficient use of public dollars.”
