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City faces pipe, public pressure
Weimar City Council lengthily discussed the origins, resolutions and costs to the dirty water reports before approving a $200,000 budget amendment to begin work, Thursday, July 24.
Councilman Carlton Tucker voiced strong displeasure and frustration over a lack of action on the dirty water being “a pretty standard practice over the years.” Community members echoed his remarks with complaints about the slow timeline and having to purchase personal filters. Weimar City Manager Donald Dixson took responsibility and explained two main causes of the dirty water: deadend water lines and old, rusty pipes.
“My apologies. It’s taking us a little bit longer to move in the direction of getting these repaired. It’s quite more extensive than I had imagined, but we are working on it,” Dixson said.
Frustration over stagnation
Dixson explained that the dead-end water lines trap water, allowing stagnation. The stagnant water will change color, smell and collect rust. He said that heavy water usage increases the line’s water flow, drawing in dirty water from the dead ends.
“If there’s heavy usage in these areas here — like 6:30 in the morning, lot of people are taking a shower, wives up cooking breakfast, running sinks, starting laundry, getting all that water flowing — the water … gets drawn back into that line,” Dixson said. “[When] the heavy usage stops, then this water pressure from the city comes back into that line and forces dirty water up into your yard lines.”
According to Weimar Mayor Milton Koller, when houses were constructed due to city expansion in the 1960s, their water lines were linked but not to the main water line loop. The main loop creates a constant flow of water through the city’s pressurized system, preventing stagnation. The amount of dead-end water lines increases further from the main water line loop. The city intends to focus on areas based on the highest number of complaints.
“Not that the other [areas] aren’t that important, but when you have that many concentrated in one area, putting your efforts in there is going to help [overall],” Koller said.
Complaints identified the Bartell and Cypher loops as two hot spots. City crews have already worked on the Bartell Loop and will focus on the Cypher Loop next. After those areas are fixed, the city will employ contractors to begin work on the main water line near Center Street.
“To date, since we’ve fixed that one area of Bartell Loop, we have not received any complaints from the two most frequently called in houses,” Dixson said.
The contractors will supplement the city’s small crew of about five to six people. Councilmembers reported slow communication both internally and with contractors. In addition, the council discussed not having a defined scope of work for contractors both for the closure of dead ends and for replacing the old pipes.
“Another question would be to what extent do you want to look at replacement of the lines… We will need a little more direction on what to tell the contractors, so they know what to bid,” Dixson said. “If we just give them, ‘Well, we just need all these lines replaced,’ it’s going to be astronomical because they are going to cover themselves really good.”
Busting the rust
The old, rusting water pipes throughout the city are made of galvanized metal, cast iron and asbestos cement and will eventually need to be replaced with PVC ones, according to Dixson. The pipes leech high amounts of iron into the water, contaminating it and changing its color. Eventually, all of the old pipes will need to be replaced. However, the council discussed that not all water lines are mapped.
“There are even some unmentioned lines ... They’re just all over the city,” Dixson said.
Koller encouraged people to call and file complaints to help locate problem areas, including unmapped pipes. Complaint calls generate work orders that can be mapped.
“You got to call in so we can have some knowledge of really where it is and pinpoint,” Koller said.
Residents can call the Public Works and Utilities Department at (979) 7258554. To assist with the high iron levels, the city will also utilize polyphosphate chemical treatment on the pipes to sequester the iron and corrosion, under recommendation from AOS Treatment Solutions.
“[The polyphosphates] go in and coat the inner linings of that and stop it from getting rusty so quickly,” Director of Finance David Mason said.
Mason said that the treatment company will begin with flushing the lines with the polyphosphates, resulting in an increase in dirty, brown water for about two weeks before clearing up. He also said that city workers will be going around to flush the wells, tanks and city lines as well over the next few weeks. The flushing will remove the stagnant water to provide temporary relief and prepare for future repairs.
“You’ll see us around. We are not wasting water. We are getting rid of the tainted water in the lines to get it clear for you guys,” Mason said.
As the city tackles closing dead ends, Mason said that crews will also replace any pipelines if and as they are exposed. The council recognized that the complete replacement of old pipelines will be a multi-year project.
Lost on the cost
Due to the full scope of the project being unknown, Dixson could not provide an exact estimation of costs for the entire project. Dixson said he and Mason roughly calculated the cost of only connecting the 61 dead ends to be $1 million.
Mason said that next fiscal year’s budget includes $370,000 for water lines and $300,000 for streets. Mason suggested doing the water line repairs before the street repairs to avoid digging up recently repaired roads.
The city council wrapped up its discussion by approving a $200,000 budget amendment for this fiscal year to address the most urgent dead ends in the city and to allow further discussion on contractors.
“If there’s heavy usage in these areas here — like 6:30 in the morning, lot of people are taking a shower, wives up cooking breakfast, running sinks, starting laundry, getting all that water flowing — the water … gets drawn back into that line. [When] the heavy usage stops, then this water pressure from the city comes back into that line and forces dirty water up into your yard lines.”
Donald Dixson Weimar city manager
