Water Main Construction Causes Explosion of Discontent

The old water main that ran down Main Street in Dobbs Ferry may never actually have exploded, but local business owners' anger over the construction project to fix it did. 

Since the beginning of May, private contractors hired by United Water of New Rochelle have turned Main Street virtually into a construction site, working from the corner of Cedar and Main Streets (in front of Sushi Mike's) all the way down to the end of Main Street.

And local business owners operating in the vicinity have been less than thrilled by the process.

"Our business has without a doubt gone down 30 percent because of this project alone," Jim Piacentino, co-owner of DJ's Brite Whites, said.  "We have had to lay off two employees because of it."

Piacentino said that in addition to noise and lack of parking deterring customers from patronizing his dry cleaners/Laundromat, a slow leak eventually culminated in a small flood in the basement of his shop.

"The leak had been going on for over a month," Piacentino said. "The village even asked United Water to do something about it.  Nothing was ever done."

But despite local merchants willingness to express their angst to open ears, Village Administrator Marcus Serrano said he knew nothing about their hardships until Monday morning when an argument ensued as a result of the flood.

"I haven't had one phone call," Serrano said. "I have never denied anyone access to me and my door is always open."

John Di Bari, who runs Di Bari Engineering P.C., adjacent to Piacentino's store, expressed similar frustrations.

"We can't figure out who's responsible for the project; there seems to be no real management," Di Bari said. Although none of the water leaking into the dry cleaners managed to infiltrate his business, Di Bari said he had feared it would come.

"They had mud oozing through the street-facing wall," he said. "It's the predictable result of allowing water to run unhindered for three months."

Steve Raines, owner of Steve Raines Inc., the independent contracting firm hired by United Water, said he also had heard nothing from local businesses until the recent conflict with Piacentino.

Serrano said he was surprised suddenly to learn the number of businesses negatively affected by the construction—the merchants, however,stressed that it was the village's obliviousness with which they took the greatest issue.

"I'm tired of officials ignoring us," Di Bari said. "Never once did anyone from the village walk up and down the street to ask us how business was going. For the inflated tax rates here, we want proper representation from officials during such a major construction project."

Serrano, though, argued the burden was on the merchants to seek him out and express their dissatisfaction before it had festered into feelings of full-blown resentment.

"I have a lot to do; I don't have time to go up and down Main Street to find out how everyone is doing," Serrano said. "E-mail me, call me, stop by village hall. I would have listened."

The project should be complete, Raines said, within three weeks—two weeks from this Friday for the taps to be finished, and then a little more time for sidewalk restoration. 

And after that, local merchants just hope to put the dust, mud, noise and parking restrictions behind them and return to business as usual.  Scratch that, business as better than before.

"I don't want this to become personal or to feed the flames by calling anybody out," Piacentino said. "I would just like some acknowledgement from the village that this has hurt us—and an effort on their part to help rebuild business on Main Street."