Water Department (Village)

The Village of Saugerties watershed is one of the best water supplies in the Northeast. It has four main streams that flow into the Blue Mountain Reservoir. They are: The Plattekill, the Cotton, the Lucaskill and the Manorville. There are many small streams and springs that flow down from the great Catskill Mountains. The watershed area is approximately 17 square miles.

Under the reservoir is an aquifer that covers approximately 7,000 acres. The daily flow over the dam is about five million gallons per day. The capacity of the reservoir is about three million gallons. This accounts for the Village of Saugerties having always had a constant and ample supply of water, even when other communities in the area might be experiencing a drought situation.

In 1997, The Village of Saugerties Mayor and Village Board, together with consultants Wayne Debrosky and Joseph Waters (Brinnier & Larios Engineers, and the Ulster County Health Department (UCHD) developed a plan, over a five-year period, to upgrade the Village's water treatment plant and water distribution system.  The reason for these upgrades were to ensure an adequate and safe supply of quality potable water; upgrade ageing or technically obsolete plant equipment, and to ensure the Village's continued compliance with all Federal and State regulatory requirement and/or regulations.

There are many facets of this plan, too numerous to cover here.  The most important improvement made to the Village's distribution system was made in 2000.  Construction started in Spring 2000 on a new three million gallon water storage tank off of Blue Mountain Road.

Construction continued until November 2000, when the new storage tank was put online.  This increased the storage capacity of the Village's system by 2100%, enhanced fire protection for Village and Town residents, provided storage for over three days of average usage by system users, and allowed plant operators to shut down the water filtration plant during emergencies and for routine maintenance.

Through the efforts of the Village of Saugerties and their engineers and consultants, Standard Construction, and the Ulster County Healthe Department, the Village has a state of the art water filtration plant that will serve its users for many years into the future.  These upgrades were made possible using a five-year plan to coordinate and schedule the various project stages, production and construction schedules, and communications with state regulatory agencies.

Water Quality

The 2020 (and 2019, for a year-to-year comparison) Water Quality Reports for the Village of Saugerties are avaiable as downloadable PDFs in the following "Documents" section.