City leaders in Newark are celebrating a major milestone this week, unveiling a 20 million dollar transformation of the Pequonic Water Treatment Plant with improvements that are expected to make cleaner, safer drinking water for the roughly 350,000 people it serves.

It's the latest chapter in Newark's effort to restore trust in the city's water system following a lead crisis that shook Newark seven years ago and a mission to make sure a similar situation never happens again.

Raven Santana reports.

We operate pumps, monitor levels, pressure gate pressures.

This summer, Newark finished a $20 million upgrade at the Pequanic Water Treatment Plant, which has been running since 1989.

I got a behind-the-scenes look at the changes.

The plant now pumping out up to 60 million gallons of clean drinking water a day for nearly 400,000 people.

I know if I tell Newarkers, they might not clearly understand everything we're talking about, but what they will know is that they're getting clean water every single day.

The water is safe to use and that we'll be able to deliver it to more and more customers throughout the state.

Mayor Raz Baraka joined Water and Sewer Director Kareem Adim, NJDEP Deputy Commissioner Katie Angarone and other state leaders for a tour marking the plant's state-of-the-art refresh.

The upgrades were financed through the New Jersey Infrastructure Bank, and officials say that saved taxpayers more than $7 million in borrowing costs.

The plant superintendent Kevin Greer walked us through some of those improvements, including a new SCADA control system, which continuously tracks flows, pressure, chemical levels and water quality, while allowing operators to adjust treatment in real time to keep drinking water safe.

This is our upgraded state-of-the-art new SCADA system.

We have the ability to control our dosages based on the parts per million that we prescribe on a daily basis.

We get 24-hour readings that gives us the daily reports that we send out to the city every day.

The plant also swapped out its old sand and gravel filters for new ones designed to catch forever chemicals like PFAS, contaminants that don't break down easily and have been linked to cancers and other serious health risks.

Greer showed us how the water moves through the new filtration system where it's then tested in the lab.

GAC is the new technology that removes a lot of the PFAS, right, new technology for filtration.

All our filters used to be standard filtrate filters, sand, gravel and anthracite.

We upgraded to GAC.

These improvements come after hard lessons.

Just seven years ago, failed corrosion controls here caused lead to leach into Newark's water supply impacting thousands of residents.

Since then, the city has fixed its corrosion control issues.

And replaced all 23,000 of its known lead service lines at no cost to homeowners and officials.

Here I spoke with say the newly upgraded investments are not just about fixing past problems but about protecting the city's water supply for generations to come.

You know nobody pays attention to water until they don't have any or until they have too much of it.

You know the men and women that work in water and wastewater infrastructure, they're the hidden jewels.

You know when you wake up in the morning you just want to go in the bathroom and turn that tap on.

Long as water comes out you're happy.

Right?

When you flush the toilet, long as the water goes out, you're happy.

So I just think, you know, it's a pleasure and it's a great accomplishment that the men and women that actually work here every day, 24-hour operation, is recognized for the commitment they do for our residents to provide safe drinking water for those people in Newark and those surrounding communities.

It's about the business that wants to locate in your community as well.

And certainly it's about the people.

Every single one of these decisions has implications for public health.

And when you make the right decision, people are protected.

That's the bottom line.

For residents, officials say the message is clear.

Newark's water is not only safe, but it's getting cleaner.

For NG Spotlight News, I'm Raven Santana.

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