Water issues continue for Georgetown residents

Months after the province promised fixes to improve water issues in Georgetown, residents and businesses in the Three Rivers community wereonce again dealing with water frustrations.

In the past weekthere have been at least threeoccasions where residents have been without water.About 120 residents and businesses in Georgetown are connected to a water utility owned by the province.

When StacyToms with the Maroon Pig Art Gallery and Sweet Shop started her work day at 5 a.m. one day last week, she discovered she didn't have water, and couldn't bake bread.

"I had a disappointed customer that didn'tget bread that week because I have to start that first thing in the morning," Toms said.

"Every outage means we lose money."

'Very disappointed'

This experience is nothing new for Toms. Residentsin Georgetown have been dealing with water frustrations for years. In December, the crown corporation that operates the utility promised a permanent fix to the problems.

That included adding a fourth well to improve water supply and pressure, as well as installing a computer system that allows wells to be reset remotely after a power outage meaning a shorter wait for water to be restored.

Those things were done.

That's why Three Rivers Deputy Mayor Debbie Johnston saidshe was surprised to hear from Georgetownresidents on Monday that they were experiencing water issues once again.

"I know council has had expectations that this system would be up and running without any problems. And I'm very disappointed. I'm disappointed in the operators, and I'm disappointed in the province for, you know for having a system that all of these problems are occurring in," Johnston said.

Programing issue caused problems

The water utility is run byEnvironmental Industrial Service Incorporated, a provincial Crown corporation. Manager John Kelly saidthe computer program that allows the wells to be monitored and controlled remotely was installed in early March.

He saidthe water issues in recent days were caused by a programing issue with that new technology.

Staff were on site in Georgetown on Monday, working to fix the problem.

While on site, they also began installing another new toolwhich will notify staff anytime there is an issue with the system, meaning any future problems should be fixed much more quickly.

'Significant' improvements

Despite this week'sissues, Kelly saidthe recent work has meant a big improvement for the community.

"I think a lot of the frustration for everybody's come out of the fact that there have been issues that pre-dated the completion of the work, with some of the power bumps and stuff that we've experienced that have caused us to go down in the wells," Kelly said.

Going forward, he said, customers should see fewerand shorterinterruptions to water supply.

"The improvements that we've made and continue to make are significant."

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