Maintenance leaves residents without water for six hours

Maintenance to the water system left the City of Atlanta without running water Thursday evening for about six hours. On June 6, Atlanta City Manager Danica Porter issued an important public notice regarding conservation in anticipation of a planned repair at the water treatment plant at Graphic Packaging which processes the city water.

The City issued a release on Monday informing the community through multiple news outlets that there may be some outages beginning on Wednesday the 12th. The Journal-Sun posted the release on their Facebook page and the front page of the paper. The release informed the City that “The city of Atlanta is issuing a water conservation request to all residents and businesses in the city of Atlanta. Repairs are scheduled for Wednesday, June 12th beginning at 11:00 p.m. For work associated with the water treatment plant at Graphics Packaging. The water supply to the city will be down for an estimated 30 hours.”

Residents were asked in the release to avoid non-essential water uses such as irrigation, and filling swimming pools. Basic water-saving measures will help conserve water during the outage and allow the system to operate from water stored in tanks.” The release noted.

“The city is making all efforts to plan for this outage. In the event that the pressure falls below minimum levels a precautionary boil order may be issued.”

On Thursday evening at around 8:00 p.m. began to stop flowing and at approximately 11:00 p.m. the water stopped completely. The City at that point subsequently sent out two press releases informing the City of the lack of water, and the boil notice. The water came back on form at around 2:00 a.m.

On June 15 the boil notice was rescinded. The release stated, “On June 13, 2024, the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality required the City of Atlanta Public water system, PWS ID #0340001 to issue a Boil Water Notice to inform customers, individuals, or employees that due to conditions which occurred recently in the public water system, the water from this public water system was required to be boiled prior to use for drinking water or human consumption purposes.

“The public water system has taken the necessary corrective actions to restore the quality of the water distributed by this public water system used for drinking water or human consumption purposes and has provided TCEQ with laboratory test results that indicate that the water no longer requires boiling prior to use as of June 15, 2024.

“If you have questions concerning this matter, you may contact Becky Allen at 903-796-7153.”

Some people were still “caught unaware” of the potential water situation and began to post their frustration on social media and elsewhere.

Mayor James Brooks issued this statement on Facebook Thursday evening: Facts to remember in your time of frustration: 1. Atlanta buys water from Texarkana.

2. Everything has a limited life, the water intake work was inevitable at some point, regardless of who has oversight and responsibility.

3. It’s going to be ok, the work requiring the shutdown has been completed and water is flowing again.

4. It takes time to fill our tanks so that we can get back to normal pressures and as close to normal as Atlanta can be. This takes longer when our supply flow is a fraction of what it should be.

5. Not a single media outlet will get the word out to everyone. Brooks then sarcastically said, “We are working on a program with the car warranty spammers to utilize their services in spreading the word on any events going forward.”

In the press release issued Thursday evening by the Atlanta, City Manager Danica Porter let residents know there was water available to residents through the Atlanta Fire Department. Porter said some residents came to get water, but there was still some available.

On Monday Porter said that even though the word went out to multiple news outlets and through social media she was investigating an opt-in news alert system for the future so that anyone in the county could get news alerts on the phone.