Town Of Hempstead Doles Out Almost $140K For 1,4 Dioxane Treatment Upgrades In Levittown Water District

LEVITTOWN, NY — The Hempstead Town Board approved the payment of almost $140,000 for 1,4 Dioxane treatment upgrades in the Levittown Water District Tuesday, financing for unexpected costs at five wells in the district.

Tuesday’s meeting featured three 1,4 Dioxane-related items in the administrative calendar, listed as items 15, 16 and 17 on the agenda. The administrative calendar was adopted by unanimous vote from the board.

1,4 Dioxane is hardly a new frontier for the Town, which sued chemical companies in 2019 over the presence of the carcinogen in its water supply. Reports from 2019 found that there were elevated levels of Chromium and Radium in Levittown’s water between 2012 and 2017, while 2016 tests found that 1,4 Dioxane was present in almost three quarters of the water supply on Long Island. As recently as this year, federal funds have continued to pour in to address 1,4 Dioxane contamination in the Town of Hempstead.

In 2024, the Environmental Protection Agency found that 1,4 Dioxane presented “an unreasonable risk of injury to health” and currently classifies it as “likely to be carcinogenic to humans.”

At Tuesday’s meeting, the board approved three items to pay unforeseen costs to H2M Architects + Engineers, the firm that has been retained to “perform the necessary design work and supervise the construction activities necessary to provide plans and specifications, supervision and design and to obtain permits and approvals necessary to upgrade treatment” at multiple wells in the Levittown Water District, the agenda reads.

First among those 1,4 Dioxane-related agenda items is number 15, which allots an extra $77,160 to H2M for engineering services including the design and construction of a 1,4 Dioxane treatment system in Levittown Water District wells 5A and 6B.

“During the course of construction a number of unforeseen and unanticipated conditions and events were encountered which were not anticipated in the original proposal which substantially changed efforts required,” the agenda reads.

According to the agenda, these extra engineering costs are in the public interest and the project is now not to exceed $1,062,400.00 total.

Also on the agenda is item 16, which allocates an extra $10,150 to H2M, this time for unforeseen charges at Levittown Water District Well 13. Following approval, the project will have a new “not to exceed” amount of $945,900.00, per the town agenda.

The third Levittown water-related item on the agenda is item 17, which allocates an extra $52,500 for 1,4 Dioxane treatment and nitrate removal engineering at Levittown Water District Wells 1A and 2A. Upon approval, the project has a new “not to exceed” amount of $1,267,450. As with the first two water-related agenda items, the town’s agenda says the additional cost aims to cover unforeseen costs that emerged during the course of engineering work already contracted.

The town did not say what unforeseen costs had arisen in its agenda or during the vote on the administrative calendar.