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Mercy Walworth to get water service from Williams Bay

WILLIAMS BAY — Mercy Health System is poised to access the Williams Bay water system for service to Mercy Walworth Hospital and Medical Center, which is slated for expansion in mid-2011.

Mercy Walworth sits on a parcel beyond village limits at the intersection of highways 50 and 67 in Geneva Township.

Village and Mercy officials for months have been negotiating an agreement to extend the village water system outside the existing service area to the facility. Both parties finally have settled on a deal that makes sense, said Village President Don Weyhrauch and Mercy Vice President Rich Gruber.

The Williams Bay Village Board is expected to approve the agreement at its meeting Monday. It also is expected to approve an ordinance that defines its water service area and stipulates what properties are allowed to hook up to the system.

Plans call for expanding the existing Mercy Walworth Hospital and Medical Center from 60,000 square feet to almost 200,000 square feet to include additional hospital beds, a birthing center, an intensive care unit and an outpatient clinic.

Mercy gets its water from a well on the property, and an expanded facility would overburden the well, which is why the hospital is seeking access to village water.

The agreement states that Mercy will pay for the installation of more than 2 miles of pipe costing more than $1.5 million, as well as engineering and legal fees.

The agreement also states that Mercy will pay a share of the costs of expanding the village water treatment plant if water usage at the hospital increases enough to warrant expansion.

Mercy previously offered to pay a "premium" in addition to what a typical commercial water customer would pay, but the state Public Service Commission, which regulates water rates, prohibits such a charge, Weyhrauch said.

Mercy officials instead will pay the village a "payment in lieu of taxes" each year, Gruber said. The amount is equal to what the village would receive in water rates if a residential subdivision was using the same amount of water as the hospital, Gruber said.