New documents reveal the situation inside one of the state's most troubled public utilities is even more severe than originally known.

The new findings, uncovered by investigative reporter Jeff Pillets for the Jersey Vindicator, show the state had to throw out thousands of water quality tests that threaten waterworks and slap the utility with a hefty fine.

All due to, as NJ Spotlight News has reported, fraud, mismanagement and other operational failures, including a criminal indictment pending against an employee who falsified those water reports.

The new revelations come as state regulators are pressuring Trenton leaders to get on board with an effort to regionalize control of the utility.

Jeff Pillets joins me now to break down what the new discoveries mean for the city of Trenton and the people who rely on the system.

Jeff, good to see you, as always.

I want to start with the top line here.

What exactly did you learn and have we learned about just how deep of a problem this is and how deep it ran within Trenton Waterworks?

Well, we had known for a while, of course, that there were problems and they were deep seated problems.

But the DEP commissioner, Sean LaTourette, pulled a surprise visit and went public with it.

And he sent out around all these photos showing all sorts of decay.

The roof was caving in.

There were extension cords in water and things like that.

So he seemed to put a lot sharper focus on it.

He seemed to be quite upset.

He claims that it's the worst he's ever seen and the worst water utility in New Jersey and that it's in threat of imminent collapse.

So he's upset.

He's going on the offensive and he's taking this thing to a new level now.

Yeah.

I mean, the utility itself was fined a couple hundred thousand dollars, found in violation of several things.

But I'm thinking about the safety of the drinking water as well, when, as you report and as we've reported, 90 percent of the samples were thrown out, you know, tossed for being invalid.

What can you tell us about sort of the current status of how folks are feeling in the city and whether or not they should have trust in what they're getting out of their tap?

For the first time, it seems that there's there really this issue really seems to have reached down into the into the populace, into the grassroots.

If you look at social media websites around the city, there are dozens of people commenting.

There are people seem really seem to be aware now that there is an imminent threat.

The water appears to be safe now, but they said it was safe before.

And it turns out they threw out 90 percent of the samples because there was a fraudulent water sampler.

So if we went basically a whole year not knowing what the quality of the water was during that time.

So, you know, you don't you don't really you can't really say with confidence what the quality of the water is.

I think it's OK.

They say it's OK. Sean LaTourette, the DEP, said it's OK.

But the bottom line is that on any given day it could go bad.

There can be a collapse.

There could be a failure.

And that's what is motivating the DEP about this.

Brianna.

Yeah.

I mean, what do you attribute to this?

I'll say a shift in tone from the DEP.

Of course, the sheer fact that the commissioner paid that visit, made the information public.

What type of infighting is happening here?

Why are they sort of ramping up?

Why is this escalating?

I think there's a lot going on in terms of that.

I think that the DEP commissioner is now a short timer.

The Murphy administration has only got a few months, you know, four or five months left, six months left.

So I think everybody's positioning for what's going to happen next.

The city seems to have changed its tone, too.

They were very, they seem to be very amenable to having a study of a regional authority that would take over governance of the water authority.

That seems to have changed all of a sudden as these billboards have sprung up around Trenton.

There seems to be a, you know, somewhat of a grassroots push against a takeover.

But to be honest, there's widespread misunderstanding of what it would mean.

The state doesn't really want to take it over at all.

They just want to form a regional authority that would give the suburbs more of a say and provide more financial stability and oversight into what's going on here.

So we've reached a new stage in this infighting, but the outcome is really unclear.

Yeah.

I mean, what's the latest with that, with the plans for regionalizing, where the council stands, and what's really at stake in this fight for control?

The DEP hired a consultant who's going to, who's supposed to study it, but the city hasn't formally signed on to that.

Mayor Gus Yora said he was going to sign on months ago.

He was behind this.

Now all of a sudden he's dragging his feet on it.

The city council is supposed to vote on whether they're going to support this study.

People in city council seem to believe that supporting the study means supporting regionalization, that those two things are equal.

But they're not.

It's just a study, and they would still have to take a vote whether to approve the study and join a regional authority over a year from now when this happens.

So it's still up in the air.

The bottom line is there's a huge amount of confusion going on and backbiting.

Jeff Pillets for us.

Jeff, great reporting as always.

Thank you so much for coming on the show.

Thanks, Brianna.

I appreciate it.

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