As the legislative season in Albany begins to wind down,our time is primarily filled with ensuring our local towns and communities are given final support and permissions before the next legislative cycle begins. The bills we pass often come at the request of individual townships and range from ensuring local justices can serve in townships where they don’t reside to adjusting local tax rates. One of the many bills I’m working on in the Assembly is ensuring the Town of Warwick can expand what it uses its community preservation fund for, and in this case, it’s expanding it for water quality improvement projects, aquatic habitat restoration projects, pollution prevention projects and stormwater collection systems.

Over the past four years, the Town of Warwick has been conducting studies on the water that supplies residents’ homes, and traces of lead have been found in many instances. While the level of particulates in the water has thus far been considered safe by New York state standards, the Town of Warwick and I agreed that an increase in water quality protection and improvement would greatly benefit Warwick residents.

Up to thirty percent of the community preservation fund will now be accessible for the management and stewardship of new preservation and quality systems, and up to ten percent of the fund can be implemented directly for the development of these new tools and equipment that will keep the water clean.

The Town of Warwick knows how important clean water is to its functioning, and we all inherently rely on the water we get from our faucets to be safe and pure. We certainly don’t want a situation to develop where this problem goes unabated and begins to cause harm. While rare, there are instances nationwide where public water doesn’t comply with health standards, and for a nation (and state) like ours, clean water should always be a top priority. We owe it to our kids, our seniors and all of our neighbors to protect their water.

I applaud the Town of Warwick for taking initiative and ensuring that its public water remains clean for its residents. Equipment updates and procedure advances are always coming, so it behooves us to stay with the times and make sure residents are getting the best they can. I’ll be glad to report when this bill has passed the Assembly, and I look forward to working with more towns to ensure their individual needs are met before session’s end this year.