Do you have a sinking feeling about infrastructure?

The Nassau County Legislature voted this week to authorize $15 million to replenish a capital budget that was used for repairs on two disruptive sinkholes — one in Baldwin and one in Lido Beach.

And then a third sinkhole opened on Sunday in Oceanside — on Foxhurst Road, between Oceanside Road and Locust Avenue — when an underground water pipe burst.

Malverne Mayor Tim Sullivan said he and the village board have been working with utility companies to repair and upgrade the village’s infrastructure.

“We have been aggressively targeting the upgrade of our infrastructure by continuing our street replacement program, obtaining commitments from Liberty Water for water main replacements, working with National Grid on gas line and meter upgrades and PSEG on more reliable regional power distribution,” Sullivan told the Herald. “Additionally, we have been putting pressure on PSEG and communication providers to maintain their overhead wiring infrastructure, which, in my own view, is a visual pollution that needs to be minimized and an area of concern that all of us need to pay more attention to before we face another major storm.”

Meanwhile, members of the Legislature’s Public Works, Finance, and Rules committees voted unanimously on Monday to approve amendments to the 2023-24 capital plan and dedicate additional resources to the “lateral sewer repair” capital budget line. In the past few weeks, funds had been tapped for the repairs of the Lido Boulevard and Baldwin sinkholes.

“This is the first of many significant investments that we must make in order to rebuild and reinforce Nassau County’s aging critical infrastructure,” Legislator Debra Mulé said. “As we look ahead to the 2024 capital plan, I am committed to ensuring that vital resources for road, sewer, and water infrastructure are our county’s top priorities.”

The sinkholes have interrupted daily activity in high-traffic areas. In addition to one on Grand Avenue in Baldwin, the Lido Beach sinkhole opened up on Lido Boulevard on May 31, and took two weeks to complete while stifling east-west traffic on the barrier island.

“The sinkholes happened because of the aging of the sewer infrastructure,” said Lauren Sternberg, a spokeswoman for Veolia North America, which operates the sewer systems in Lido Beach, Oceanside and Baldwin. “These were 70-year-old pipes that had reached the end of their life cycle. The failure of the underground sewer pipe resulted in the ground above the pipe collapsing, and then the roadway collapsed.”

“As our village has recently surpassed 100 years old, we face some of the same infrastructure aging concerns as the county and the country as a whole,” Sullivan said. “Fortunately, we’re paying close attention to it, and have been encouraged by the county’s rapid mobilization when emergencies occur, and the cooperation of our state representatives in addressing the needs of our community from the private utility providers.”

Sternberg explained that the sinkholes occurred due to different infrastructure failures. In the case of Lido Boulevard, a manhole failed 20 feet below ground. In Baldwin, sewage was seeping up from a broken 36-inch sewage pipe below Grand Avenue. She added that the exact costs of the repairs were not yet available.

“No part of our county or our region is immune from infrastructure failures like the ones we have experienced during the last month,” Mulé wrote in letters to local, state and federal representatives July 3. “We must take decisive action to protect our environmental assets and secure the health and safety of all Nassau County residents by averting future catastrophes such as the ones that the residents of Baldwin and Lido Beach have endured.”

Additionally, Mulé appealed to Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer and Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand to continue advocating for an accelerated arrival of funds meant for Nassau County via recent federal infrastructure deals. The Bipartisan Infrastructure Bill was signed into law by President Biden in November 2021, and directed that more than $110 billion to be used across the country to update and maintain infrastructure, including In Nassau County.

“I write with an urgent plea for your offices to work in partnership with your federal colleagues to take all necessary steps to expedite the delivery of funding that has been earmarked for New York State and Nassau County in the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act,” Mulé wrote to Schumer and Gillibrand.

Officials say that final approval for additional bonding could come as soon as the County Legislature’s next scheduled meeting, on Aug. 7.

Sullivan said that Malverne would seek to create a special commission to continue to oversee infrastructure with an eye on the future.

“I have discussed and have received enthusiastic reception from our village board about creating our own Utility Commission to study all these infrastructure aspects more thoroughly on our local level so that we can plan more effectively for our future,” Sullivan said. “We will share more details about the mission and members of this proposed Commission in the near future.”

Additional reporting by Mark Nolan.