A nearly $6 million low interest loan to Marseilles from the state was part of more than $170 million in such loans awarded to help finance local infrastructure projects during the state's 2008 fiscal year.

The Marseilles City Council voted Sept. 17 to have the Mayor Jim Trager sign a $5.9 million, 20-year low-interest loan with the Illinois Environmental Protection agency. The funds will be used to improve the city's wastewater treatment plant and repaid through already enacted increases in city sewage charges.

Communities across the state benefit from the Illinois EPA’s infrastructure loan programs, according to year-end reports just released from Gov. Rod Blagojevich.

The loans, which sometimes are combined with other grants, loans and various types of technical assistance, allow cities and towns of all sizes to afford the high cost of repairing and replacing the equipment necessary to ensure safe drinking water, and to protect rivers and streams from contaminated discharges from wastewater treatment plants.

"These low-interest rates benefit the taxpayer by improving services and making communities more desirable locations for economic development," Blagojevich said.

The overall quality of the water in Illinois has steadily improved over the last 35 years, in part due to the continued success of these financing assistance programs, he said. In addition, Illinois public water supplies consistently provide a high quality of drinking water. The financing comes from the Illinois EPA and the State Revolving Fund that utilizes a combination of federal, state and loan repayment funding to provide loans, he said.

The loans are provided at half the market interest rate and are used by communities for eligible drinking water and wastewater treatment projects. Interest and principal paid on the loans is returned to the fund to support low-interest loans to other communities.

"It is through this state and federal partnership that we are able to address the infrastructure needs of our communities,"; said Illinois EPA Director Doug Scott. "I appreciate the efforts of Illinois' congressional delegation and state legislators to adequately fund the State Revolving Fund, a program that is vital in helping communities with the construction and maintenance of effective drinking systems."

In federal fiscal year 2008, which ran from Oct. 1, 2007, through Sept. 30, 2008, the Illinois EPA awarded wastewater loans totaling $108.7 million and drinking water loans totaling $66 million.

In FFY 2007, wastewater loans totaled $153.2 million and drinking water loans totaled $32.5 million for a total of $185.7 million. In all, 31 communities across Illinois accessed 2.5 percent, simple interest loans for environmental infrastructure projects in FFY 2008. Over the life of those loans, the interest savings generated for those communities will total more than $50 million, Scott said.

The largest recipient of a waste water loan, such as the one Marseilles received, was the Metropolitan Water Reclamation District of Greater Chicago, which received $27,697,350 for a pump station. The smallest loan, $335,265 went to Villa Park.