SAXONBURG - The Saxonburg Area Authority will be out of the water business in August.

The authority board Thursday accepted a $6 million offer from the Pennsylvania-American Water Co. for its drinking water system.

Authority officials stress the move was strictly for fiscal reasons.

"It's a money issue," said authority board chairman Jay Rinebolt after the meeting. "It's a business decision."

Paul Cornetti, authority manager, agreed, saying the pending sale averts a massive rate hike for 1,100 water customers in Saxonburg, Clinton Township and Jefferson Township.

He said water customers would have faced a 59 percent rate hike otherwise because the aging water line, which stretches 14 miles from Harmar Township in Allegheny County to Saxonburg, could no longer be replaced piecemeal.

For the authority to replace the remaining 10.6 miles of pipe dating back to the 1950s, it would cost $6.4 million.

"We were going to do it," Cornetti said about replacing the main line at one time.

The change will not affect the authority's 3,400 sewage customers in the borough and four townships, Clinton, Jefferson, Middlesex and Penn.