Essex County, New Jersey
North Caldwell has to find every lead service line by 2031.
The hard part is not the lead already on the books. It is the 1,975 connections whose material was never recorded, because under the rule every one of those has to be treated as lead until somebody proves otherwise.
What the law requires
P.L.2021 c.183 obliges every public community water system in New Jersey to inventory every service connection, notify the public about what it finds, and replace all lead service lines by 2031. Progress is reported to the state each year and posted publicly.
North Caldwell's lead-line duty is split across more than one water system. North Caldwell is served by more than one public community water system, at least one of which is the town's own. The c.183 duty is split, and which parcels fall to whom has to be resolved before anything is promised.
Why the unknowns are the expensive part
1,975 of the connections in North Caldwell's inventory have no recorded material, which is 86% of it. At that scale the unknowns, not the known lead, are what the programme actually costs.
A service line recorded as unknown is not a confirmed lead line. It means nobody wrote the material down, often decades ago. The rule does not let that stand: an unknown is treated as lead until it is proven otherwise.
That leaves a system two ways to close the gap, and both cost money:
- Verify each one. Send a crew, excavate or pot-hole, record the material. Accurate, and the bill scales with the number of unknowns whether or not any lead turns up.
- Replace without verifying. Faster to close out, and it means paying to replace lines that were never lead.
Which is why the order you work in is the whole decision. Verifying the connections most likely to be lead first finds the real ones sooner and spends less on the ones that were never a problem.
Where North Caldwell stands
North Caldwell is served by 4 public community water systems: 2 operated by the town (North Caldwell WD, North Caldwell - Hilltop) and 2 regional suppliers (Fairfield WD, NJ American Water - Little Falls). The c.183 duty follows the system, not the municipal boundary, so North Caldwell's own obligation is what its own systems reported in its 2024 filing.
North Caldwell WD (PWID NJ0715001) reported 0 known lead service lines, 0 galvanised lines requiring replacement, 1,950 connections whose material was never recorded, 0 confirmed not lead, as of its 2024 submission. The 1,950 unknowns are the expensive part: each one has to be identified before it can be ruled out, and until it is, it counts as lead for planning purposes.
North Caldwell - Hilltop (PWID NJ0715002) reported 0 known lead service lines, 0 galvanised lines requiring replacement, 25 connections whose material was never recorded, 325 confirmed not lead, as of its 2024 submission. The 25 unknowns are the expensive part: each one has to be identified before it can be ruled out, and until it is, it counts as lead for planning purposes.
Fairfield WD (PWID NJ0707001) reported 0 known lead lines and 0 unknown-material connections in 2024 across its whole service area, which covers more than North Caldwell. That figure is the system's, not the town's, and the share falling inside North Caldwell has to be resolved parcel by parcel before anyone can put a number on it.
NJ American Water - Little Falls (PWID NJ1605001) reported 6 known lead lines and 2,949 unknown-material connections in 2024 across its whole service area, which covers more than North Caldwell. That figure is the system's, not the town's, and the share falling inside North Caldwell has to be resolved parcel by parcel before anyone can put a number on it.
Fairfield WD
- Lead service lines reported
- 0
- Galvanised requiring replacement
- 0
- Material UNKNOWN
- 0
- Confirmed not lead
- 3,858
North Caldwell WDthe town's own
- Lead service lines reported
- 0
- Galvanised requiring replacement
- 0
- Material UNKNOWN
- 1,950
- Confirmed not lead
- 0
North Caldwell - Hilltopthe town's own
- Lead service lines reported
- 0
- Galvanised requiring replacement
- 0
- Material UNKNOWN
- 25
- Confirmed not lead
- 325
NJ American Water - Little Falls
- Lead service lines reported
- 6
- Galvanised requiring replacement
- 45
- Material UNKNOWN
- 2,949
- Confirmed not lead
- 1,444
What the state publishes, and what it does not
Published, free
NJDEP publishes how many connections each system reported as lead, galvanised, unknown and confirmed non-lead. Those are the numbers above. Systems over 3,300 people also have to put an address lookup on their own website.
Not published anywhere
Which of those unknowns to open first. The state publishes counts, not an order, and an address lookup answers one property at a time. Nobody publishes a ranked list, which is the thing a crew schedule is actually built from.
That gap is what we work in. We hold construction year for every parcel in New Jersey and the plumbing permit history behind it, so we can put a system's unknowns in order and show the evidence for each one. It is a ranking, not a diagnosis: it says where to look first, and it never claims a particular property has lead.
The arithmetic, with your numbers
1,975 unknown connections reported by the system serving this town脳your cost to verify one=what closing the gap blind costs
We do not fill in the right-hand side, because we do not know your unit cost, your crew or your contract, and a number we invented would be worth nothing to you.
What we change is the left: working in a ranked order finds the real lead earlier in the programme and reduces how much of that spend lands on connections that were never lead.
The same ranked list is also the resident notification the statute already requires, so it does two jobs for one piece of work.
Funding, and what gates it
We have not confirmed this town's hazard mitigation plan yet.
Federal hazard-mitigation funding requires a current FEMA-approved plan. We match plans automatically by county and jurisdiction name, and this one did not resolve. It does not mean the plan is missing.
That is a gap in our record, not a finding about North Caldwell.
Lead replacement is financed through the Drinking Water State Revolving Fund, with principal forgiveness available. The borrower is the water system, which is the town itself only where the town runs its own water. Which of those North Caldwell is decides who applies.
What we have not measured in North Caldwell yet
- We have not baked North Caldwell's impervious and runoff layers yet, so there is no number here. That is different from the number being zero.
- We have not baked North Caldwell's storm-drainage layer yet, so there is no number here. That is different from the number being zero.
How we know
- FEMA National Flood Hazard Layer flood zones and base flood elevation
- NJDEP MS4 outfalls the mapped storm-drainage network
- OpenFEMA HMA subapplications what happened to grant applications like yours
- FEMA Hazard Mitigation Plan Statuses the grant gate
- NJDEP service line inventory what each water system reported to the state, by year
Built from published federal and state records. Informational only, and not engineering, legal or funding advice. Confirm anything that matters with your municipal engineer and your State Hazard Mitigation Officer.
The North Caldwell read
A working session and a written read for North Caldwell: your unknowns in a ranked order with the evidence per connection, what your system has already filed, the funding route that matches who owns the duty here, and the resident notice drafted from the same list. Paid engagement, scoped in the first call.
Prefer to read first? Download the one-page North Caldwell summary.
More about North Caldwell
- Property scores in North Caldwell How the town permits, measured against every other New Jersey town