|
Getting your Trinity Audio player ready...
|
When Manning Rollerson’s water was cut off without notice in late October, he called the city of Freeport’s police department.
“What’s going on?” he asked.
A busted pipe. The water should be back on by 10 p.m, they told him.
10 p.m. came and went — and came and went again for the next two days before the water was finally turned back on.
Rollerson was frustrated, to say the least, but the lifelong Freeport resident said issues with the city’s water supply have been plaguing the community for far too long.
“The city says it is investing in our infrastructure. … But we've been having issues with the water since the 1970s,” Rollerson said.
A string of contractor errors and brutally hot Houston summers have created endless water quality problems in Freeport, a port town of 12,000 in the southern half of Brazoria County that has issued an unusually high number of water boil notices this year.
The lags in service have frustrated residents and caused some to question the quality of the water as the city puts up thousands to repair lines damaged by contractors.
Since August, the city has had seven boil water notices and numerous other water main breaks in various locations throughout the city. For comparison, the city of Houston has had zero boil water notices in the last six months.
While the recent frequency of these notices is unusual, Freeport on average sees about three to four boil water notices a year, interim city manager Lance Petty said. Extreme droughts, similar to the one the region experienced this summer, can cause the clay soil to shift in ways that can break water lines. Drops in water pressure can increase the potential for contaminants to enter the drinking supply.
Brooks Bass, the city’s mayor, said he can’t remember the last time Freeport had a major update to its water system.
The city continued to discuss potential improvements to the city’s water system in October. Freeport sought bids to replace its current wastewater treatment facility, but costs to renovate the system have since tripled, the Facts newspaper reported.
Petty said the city plans to make improving water infrastructure a priority after it completes updates to its sewer lines, which on average take in about 2.2 million gallons of water a day.
While some residents have gotten used to seeing a few issues with the water each year, others like Rollerson are looking for the city to make major improvements.
Veolia North America, Freeport’s water operator, oversees almost everything that has to do with the city’s water infrastructure, Petty said.
In the event of emergency repairs, the city is financially responsible for the repairs. Veolia subcontracts the repair work and is reimbursed through the contract’s repair maintenance budget.
In August alone, Petty said the city is expecting to pay $10,000 to $15,000 to repair damaged water lines. The Texas Department of Transportation, AT&T and CenterPoint Energy are just a few of the contractors that have struck and broken water lines.
Every contractor that does work in Freeport is supposed to reach out to Veolia to have the approximate locations of water lines marked before work is started, Petty said. But over the years, the water company has undergone multiple changes in leadership. Petty said throughout the changes, some operations managers are more hands-on than others.
The city is currently looking to end its contract with Veolia. Bass said the city has experienced “performance issues” and is in discussions on how to bring the city’s water system back under its control.
Petty said Veolia was sent a legal notice with an intent to end the contract sometime last year.
According to its agreement with the city, Veolia is also supposed to repair new water lines each year. Bass has seen some lines replaced, but hinted his concerns about the contractor's work may be one of the reasons the city is seeking to end the contract.
Bass said he couldn’t speak much to why the contract was ending in anticipation of a lawsuit the city might file against the contractor.
In a statement, Veolia said it still has a “strong working partnership” with Freeport and is fully invested in continuing operations.
“Because of the age of the city's water and wastewater facilities, Veolia and the city have dealt with numerous challenges in maintaining optimal service for the residents of Freeport,” David Heinzmann, a spokesman for Veolia, said in a statement. “Efforts to make improvements to Freeport's water and wastewater systems are ongoing, and we remain confident that Veolia's local expertise and global resources provide the most efficient solution to operate these systems within Freeport's means.”
While the city is paying for these repairs out of its emergency repair budget, the mayor said the city is aggressively going after contractors to get them to reimburse the city for damages.
This summer, routine testing of the city's water supply by the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality came back positive for total coliforms – a bacteria present in the digestive tract of animals and humans.
When initial testing for detecting coliforms may be present, the TCEQ is required to repeat tests to determine the severity of the bacteria, TCEQ spokesperson Victoria Cann said. Repeat testing this summer in Freeport came back negative for coliforms and E. coli.
The city of Freeport is considered “high” in susceptibility to contamination according to the TCEQ, meaning there are “activities near the source water and the natural conditions of the aquifer or watershed make it very likely that chemical constituents may come into contact with the source water.” It does not mean that there are any current health risks present.
“The TCEQ is committed to minimizing risks from drinking water contaminants by ensuring compliance monitoring and compliance determinations for formal enforcement are identified on a weekly basis for chemical and microbiological drinking water standards,” the agency said in a statement.
Sydney Evans is a senior science analysis with the Environmental Working Group – an environmental advocacy group specializing in toxic chemicals, water pollutants and more.
Evans said that federal drinking water regulations haven’t been updated in over 20 years. For communities, especially communities in highly susceptible and industrial areas, it’s more to look out for.
“Everyone just goes about their day assuming that the water is safe because there is treatment in place, when really there are all these vulnerabilities in our infrastructure, and it goes further than just the drinking water treatment plant,” she said. “It goes into the way toxic chemicals are regulated, and the way industrial discharges are regulated. And all of these, when you start digging into all of the vulnerabilities in our environment as it pertains to environmental health and our drinking water, it's kind of scary.”
Freeport resident Eric Hayes said while the notices and leaks are inconvenient, it’s something he’s gotten used to.
“I've been in Freeport 51 years, so over my lifetime, it's happened quite a bit,” he said.
Hayes said he has a water filter system throughout his home but usually only drinks bottled water. It tastes better, he says.
Rollerson’s trust in the city's water, however, has dwindled. An open pack of Nestle water bottles sits beside his kitchen cabinets. It’s his latest pack from his bimonthly runs to Sam’s Club about an hour north.
His trust in Freeport’s government to get the water system up to par is long gone.
City officials recognize the boil notices are inconvenient and can be alarming, but they don’t want residents to be overly concerned.
“The water is safe to drink, but all water has different minerals and deposits and things in it,” Petty said. “So it's a personal preference.”
This story has been updated to include more information on Veolia's contract with the city of Freeport.
Republish our articles for free, online or in print.
