In this file photo, Kyle Schuster, chief operator of the Dunkirk Waterworks, points out the pumps that bring Lake Erie water into the plant.

The city of Dunkirk water treatment plant is not for sale.

Mayor Kate Wdowiasz tasked city DPW Director Randy Woodbury with making that very clear at a North County Water District board meeting this week.

“The mayor has said we are not interested in selling,” Woodbury stated. “We think the offer from the county would be 10 cents on the dollar. I don’t think we’re that desperate.”

Woodbury’s statements at the meeting came after North County Water District board member Terry Niebel suggested selling the city water treatment plant to the water district as a way for Dunkirk to help pull itself out of fiscal peril. The city currently supplies the district, which includes several neighboring municipalities, with water by contract.

Woodbury said he gave Niebel a tour of the plant but “didn’t think it was an appraisal for the sale.” He told the OBSERVER after the meeting that Niebel only saw about 20% of the city water system; Niebel did not tour pumping stations, for example.

At the meeting, Woodbury said he was happy Niebel’s proposal got out in the open. However, he said it made his water plant employees nervous.

“The people at the plant are working to give you 40 years of great water,” he said. “They want to keep it the way it is.”

Niebel later said to Woodbury, “It’s an option. I just threw it out. If the city would avail itself of the option, that’s fine. If not, that’s fine, too.”

He scoffed at Woodbury’s statement that the city water system could be appraised at least at $250 million, calling it “excessive.”

Niebel, also a county legislator and owner of a real estate agency, stated the large tax hike proposed in Wdowiasz’s 2025 budget “would have a devastating effect” on the property market in the city.

District board member Dave Hazelton pointed out the district has a contract with Dunkirk to supply water. “I’m not sure that contract entails selling it privately, or anywhere else,” he said.

“If the city would move to (sell the plant), it would take a while,” district board chairman Dan Pacos said. He said attorneys and the water district board would have to thoroughly review all issues involved in it.