The modern water course — two plants, a county partnership, and a four-mile line

2024–2026 · THE TOWN AS REGIONAL UTILITY

The town's water plant now serves an industrial district larger than the town. The standing system first: the town owns and operates its water utility — an East water treatment plant and distribution system, a Water Plant reachable at (574) 654-8050 and a utility emergency line at 574-217-6229 — and in April 2024 it took a Preliminary Engineering Report for rehabilitation and expansion of the East plant and distribution improvements, funded through the Drinking Water State Revolving Fund, to public hearing at Town Hall. In July 2024 the Town, St. Joseph County, and the County Redevelopment Commission made water-service agreements for the New Carlisle Economic Development Area: the town operates two treatment plants — the Cliffs plant and the St. Joe Energy Center plant — under a joint-board arrangement with a combined withdrawal cap of 24,000,000 gallons per day. In the second half of 2025 the town filed with the Indiana Utility Regulatory Commission to establish a four-mile exclusive regulated water service boundary; the Redevelopment Commission intervened that November to protect the July 2024 agreements; and a settlement in IURC Cause No. 46314 with an amended and restated water-service agreement was approved in January 2026, expanding the town's exclusive service territory with the four-mile buffer — the growth driver being the AWS data-center and industrial development along Indiana 2 and Larrison Boulevard, the second generation of an industrial course that began with the I/N Tek and I/N Kote ground east of town.

Sources:

1. Town of New Carlisle, DWSRF Preliminary Engineering Report public-hearing notice (hearing 16 Apr 2024) and utility contact listings (townofnewcarlisle.in.gov).
2. St. Joseph County approval records, July 2024: the water-service agreements, the two plants, the joint board, the 24 MGD cap.
3. South Bend Tribune, 19 Jan 2026: the Cause 46314 settlement, the four-mile buffer, the November 2025 intervention. At press strength; the IURC order itself is the settler for the boundary's legal description.