The menu at the Ulster County Chamber of Commerce's monthly breakfast Wednesday included an impressive show-and-tell about our region's crucial contribution to the everyday lives of New York City's millions of residents. Talking about drinking water, to be clear, second only to oxygen when it comes to life's necessities.

As described by guest speaker John Milgrim, director of external affairs for the New York City Department of Environmental Protection's Bureau of Water Supply, the complex of reservoirs and aqueducts on which the Big Apple depends is of a scale to rival the waterworks of ancient Rome.

The stats are impressive. The entire system of 19 reservoirs and three controlled lakes draws on 2,000 square miles of watershed to supply 570 billion gallons of water annually — a billion a day to New York City. The system originated in the 19th-century with the creation of Westchester County's Croton Reservoir followed by, in the early 20th century, reservoirs drawing on the Delaware and Catskill Watersheds. Ulster County's chief components of the system are the 50 billion-gallon Rondout and 123 billion-gallon Ashokan reservoirs.

This being a chamber of commerce, not of history or geography, there's also a bottom line to the matter. Gargantuan aquatic monuments may make fine tributes to human ingenuity but come on: What's in it for us? As Milgrim tells it, the flow goes both ways. Water to the city, revenue and jobs to Ulster.

“Number one taxpayer in Ulster County” is how Milgrim put it, forking over $3,895,152 in county property taxes and $18,152,546 in school taxes in 2024, as well as local municipal taxes including $2,691,490 in property taxes to the Town of Wawarsing and $2,010,790 in property taxes to the Town of Olive.

Milgrim estimated DEP employment in Ulster at 200-250 jobs in laboratories, offices and in the field, a number likely to grow as major projects evolve. Chief among those for local impact is the Ashokan Century Program, a $1.3 billion repair and upgrade of the reservoir that has been years in the making and will touch on almost every physical aspect of the complex.

“We're in the middle of the planning stages, environmental planning,” Milgrim told the room. “We've been doing some investigative engineering work on the Ashokan this summer. That is starting to come to fruition. ... Ultimately, it's going to be over a decade worth of capital work [leading to] hundreds of jobs. It will be the largest capital construction project in the Catskills in generations.”

A similar project, repairs to the 85-mile long aqueduct that draws on the Delaware watershed and feeds into the Rondout Reservoir, is on hold pending new contract negotiations but will likely create jobs when it resumes, now predicted to occur in 2027.

The water supply system's collateral benefits include, Milgrim said, recreation, on the water and on land.

Trail enthusiasts will be happy to learn DEP is on the verge of completing an expansion of the Ashokan Rail Trail, a $33 million project involving bridge reconstruction and a realignment of route 28A that will connect to a new trailhead in Boiceville. “The Ashokan will be unique in the entire system with this trail network,” Milgrim said.

Public fishing rights to DEP's waters has been a feature of the system since the agency's Catskills access was first codified, as is ice harvesting. “Obviously, many people aren't harvesting ice any longer,” Milgrim noted, but “more than 2,300 rowboats for fishing are registered on the Ashokan reservoir” and “a little over 1,000” on the Rondout reservoir.

Green power advocates can take heart from Milgrim's response to a question from audience member and Ulster Legislator Manna Jo Greene (D-Rosendale), who asked about the system's production of hydro power and “future plans for clean renewable energy.”

“We generate hydro power at five facilities,” Milgrim replied. “It's enough to power about 15,000 homes just for the tunnels that serve the Rondout.” However, he noted, “It's not always that easy.” Case in point being the proposed underground hydro power facility that was withdrawn in 2021 in the face of local concern over its impact on water quality and, ironically, the environment.”

On solar power Milgrim was more assertive. “We're currently in a massive upgrade on solar ... We have a large array out on Route 28 as will most of our facilities in the city and upstate. ... Our fleet is almost entirely electric, all our cars, some of the trucks ... we're not quite there yet.”