Lake Placid utility advisers recommend keeping service boundary unchanged, focus on hookups, grants and plant connections

At a workshop on the town’s comprehensive-plan questions, the Lake Placid utilities advisory board recommended keeping the Lake Placid Regional Utility service-area boundary the same for now and focusing on connecting customers to the new treatment plant, securing grants for decommissioning older plants and shoring up utility finances.

The board’s discussion centered on whether to expand the utility boundary to include lakes and unincorporated neighborhoods north of town — including Lake June and areas around Lake Francis — or to concentrate on adding connections close to the new plant and stabilizing the utility’s cash flow. “I don’t see any sense in beating a dead horse,” Pam Brewer, a board member, said of changing the map that earlier boards had negotiated. Marlene Barker, a Lake June resident, urged the group to prioritize shorefront hot spots: “Many of the homes there have septic systems that are 60 years old. They’re 25 feet off the water.”

Bert, a utilities staff member, described the technical and financial constraints that shaped the…