Utilities

SISTER BAY WATER & SEWER UTILITY

In 1968 the Village of Sister Bay, led by Village President Bernie Hagedorn, began to look to the future to protect the environment and preserve the Village's water resources. The next Village President, "Big Dave" Anderson succeeded in acquiring the necessary grants and approvals, and eventually Village officials decided to move forward with the construction of a sewer and water system. That system was dedicated on October 14, 1973. Liberty Grove Sanitary District #1 came on line in 1979.

The Sister Bay Wastewater Treatment Plant, which serves both the Village of Sister Bay and portions of the Town of Liberty Grove, is located at 102 Autumn Court in the Village of Sister Bay. To reach the employees at the plant please call 920-854-2246.

The Sister Bay sanitary sewer collection system is a combination of gravity sewers, lift stations, and force mains. Wastewater is collected in the system and conveyed through piping to the Wastewater Treatment Plant. The existing service area of the collection system is approximately 1,200 acres in size, and serves approximately 930 connections/customers within the Village and/or the boundaries of Liberty Grove Sanitary District #1. Those persons whose properties are not connected to the sewer system have private sewage disposal systems or holding tanks.

The water system facilities operated and maintained by the Sister Bay Water Utility include three groundwater wells and pump stations, two elevated water storage tanks, four booster pumps, seven pressure reducing stations, water system controls which are located in the Wastewater Treatment Plant, and a network of transmission and distribution water mains.

Village officials are very committed to protection of the environment and preservation of the water resources, and, therefore, they have directed that a Comprehensive Utilities Plan, which fully addresses existing and future sewer and water needs, as well as stormwater management over a planning period extending to the year 2025, be prepared. The planning approach used for the study began with the identification of the existing planning area conditions, as well as an evaluation of projected future service area needs and characteristics, and a number of Comprehensive Utilities Plan Advisory Committee meetings have been conducted. A draft of the plan and related materials can be accessed by clicking on the following hyperlink:

Link to Draft of Comprehensive Utilities Plan and Related Documents

MEET THE STAFF MEMBERS WHO MAKE THE UTILITIES WORK. . .

Dependably pure water plays a huge role in the attractiveness of Sister Bay as a place to live or to visit, and we'd like to introduce you to the staff members who makethe system work.

The Utilities Manager is Steve Jacobson, who, with more than twenty-five years on the job, is senior man.

Jacobson, a life-long resident of Northern Door, finds satisfaction in serving his community. "Good water is a necessity," he says, and it pleases me to know that I have a hand in giving that to my home town."

Next in seniority is Mike Schell, who began working for Sister Bay Utilities in 1990. Like his fellow-worker Bob Lang, Schell was born in Northern Door and spent his entire life here. What is it about the area that keeps him here? "The people and the outdoor life, and I like the job." Schell says. "We do so many different tasks— I'd be bored stiff if I had to work in a factory doing the same thing hour by hour, all year long."

The job certainly presents the staff with variety. They begin each day in a neat, well-appointed chemistry lab, testing the purity of Sister Bay's water. That done, they follow an inspection routine that has them looking at each of the three wells and pumping stations, the lift stations, and the pressure-reducing stations, and then it's on to paper work, and paper work, and more paper work. . .

In their spare time they check the water pressure in each of Sister Bay's fire hydrants. By the way, all of that is only half the job - The same crew runs the Sewer Utility, which receives and treats the waste water from the Village and most of Liberty Grove.

The third man in the Sewer and Water Utilities is Bob Lang. He explains that all three of the crew members are licensed Water Works Operators, a designation that requires about thirty hours of formal instruction and three years experience. In addition, each of them must keep abreast of developments in the field with thirteen hours of formal instruction every three years. "It is a legal requirement that employees be licensed—and we think it is necessary. After all, we are dealing with the health of our community."

"All of this job and life satisfaction seems unreal," we might comment. "Isn't there something about life in the Sister Bay Utilities that you dislike?" we ask.

Mike and Bob say, with one voice, "When the phone rings at 3:00 A.M., on a cold winter night…." One of the team is on call all of the time. "It has to be that way," they explain. "The community depends on the water we supply. Some things need to be fixed now, not tomorrow or next Tuesday. Most often the Duty Man can handle the glitches, but if the need arises, we all arise too."

Since January of 2005 our Utility Clerk has been Juliana Neuman. Neuman's office is located in the Administration Building at 421 Maple Drive, and she is responsible for utility billing, collections and correspondence. Quarterly billings for sewer and water services are mailed out during the second week of the month following the end of the calendar quarter. Payments are due on the 30th of that month, (January, April, July and October). If you have any questions regarding your Utility bill please contact Juliana at 920-854-4118 or jneuman@sisterbay.com.

Serious though the work may be, there have been times…. For example, Jacobson, who has a reputation for practical jokes, heard his phone ring one night, and a mysterious voice told him that there was a boat adrift in the sewage pond—an open air body of water in which wastewater is aerated. Jacobson conscientiously climbed out of bed and set out to rescue the boat from a sea upon which it had no business sailing—only to find that it was his own boat.