After 70 years of use, Uniondale’s water tower will be replaced with a new structure.
The tower, built in 1955, required frequent and expensive maintenance due to its age.
Hempstead Town Supervisor Don Clavin explained that the town’s previous plan — repairing the existing tower for $9 million — would cost nearly as much as building a new one.
“Maintaining our drinking water infrastructure is a crucial part of protecting our town’s public health,” Clavin said at a Jan. 21 news conference. “As this water tower grows older, it requires more work and money to make sure it can continue serving its community, and it’s time for a change.”
The new tower, made of concrete and composite steel, will be built using weather-resistant construction techniques to make it easier to maintain. It will be able to serve Uniondale for generations to come, Claivn said.
The town plans to begin construction this summer, and the tower will be fully operational in 2027. Its reconstruction is a part of the town’s $225 million investment in its water systems, in addition to $85 million in federal and state grants.
Other water quality improvement projects include the addition of multiple advanced oxidation process and granular activated carbon treatment systems to its waterways, designed to treat contaminants coming out of ground water. The town is also pursuing litigation against the polluters who created a need for pollution-treatment plants.
“We take pride in our town’s efforts to be proactive in maintaining our ability to provide residents with efficient and effective water service,” Clavin said. “These projects all focus around ensuring that our drinking water remains of the highest quality and at the lowest cost possible to ratepayers.”
Community organizations in Uniondale have advocated for a new water tower for years. Pearl Jacobs has been president of Nostrand Gardens Civic Association for almost a decade.
“I really became involved with civic engagement because of the disparity, inequality and lack of investment in Uniondale, which was, and to some extent still is, an underserved community,” Jacobs said.
During her years as a community activist, she has attended town meetings, organized with local groups and supported policies to improve the lives of people in Uniondale. She has focused on improving the community’s water supply for over four years, and said she wouldn’t stop anytime soon.
The effort to have the water tower replaced “was a long fight,” Jacobs said. “Uniondale is a community that you have to advocate for. We pay our taxes, and we deserve equal treatment, just like every other community.”
Jeannine Maynard, co-facilitator of the Greater Uniondale Area Action Coalition and vice president of the Uniondale Land Trust, was one of the community leaders who advocated for improvements in local water safety.
“We’re celebrating,” Maynard said. “We fought so hard that it would be replaced, and now it is being replaced. The community is going to be watching and tracking the changes, whether it comes in with the proper filters. We’re going to be looking at the quality of the work.”
The need for a new tower was made more urgent by ongoing studies of pollutants such as PFAs — known as “forever chemicals” — and possible carcinogens such as dioxane, which can make their way into groundwater. The old tower does not meet the new safety standards required to address these problems, Maynard said.
“The community has always been invested in having environmental conditions investigated, aired out and then certainly responded to,” she said. “This water tower has been in derelict condition for many, many years. I think it was 24 years since the last real attention had been given to the tower, and since then it’s become rusted, and there’s evidence of leaking.”
In addition to the new tower, Maynard has pushed for the town to install purification filters in all six of Uniondale’s groundwater wells to stop the contamination at its source.