KINGWOOD — Public Service District 1 (PSD 1) met Wednesday with partners in the dam project in an attempt to nail down a completion date.
That meeting came the day after the district talked to Kingwood Water Works about possible temporary hookups with the Public Service District 2 end of its system.
“We’ll sell water,” Kingwood Water Board Vice Chairman Robert Deriggi said, but the board needs more information and details, such as price for the water, need to be worked out.
In 2017, the Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS) told the district it had to find a temporary source. The dam on J.W. Ruby Research Farm is being replaced. PSD 1 drew its water from the dam reservoir.
But the project is more than a year behind, and a dry year forced PSD 1 to look for additional sources. The low water in Impoundment 6, the replacement pond, also led to increases in water treatment costs and complaints about water aesthetics.
The dam contractors are working as much as possible, said Andy Deichert, state conservation engineer for NRCS, but there likely will be down time January through March.
“Who is driving the project schedule?” PSD 1 Board President Rodney Liston asked. “Please give us the information.”
Deichert said it looks to him like the contractor has two months of work in good weather. Part of the reason is earth compaction that can’t be done when soil or aggregate is frozen.
“We don’t want the water behind the reservoir prior to the embankment itself being complete and up to grade,” Deichert said. “If you were to get a severe rain event and it were to get up to the top of the dam and over the top before it was all the way up, you risk breaching.”
Brian Farkas of the West Virginia Conservation Agency (WVCA) said that modifications have been made in the contract to allow for double shifts and weekend shifts.
“We’re trying to work within the time frame we can, knowing that water is important, it is a commodity you can’t live without, and we’re trying to get this project completed as quickly as possible,” Farkas said.
Adams got a commitment from Farkas to help fund a one-time letter to all 1,600 PSD 1 customers. The letter would provide facts about the project, Adams said, perhaps ending rumors.
Eighty dams in the state are more than 50 years old, one person noted Thursday, and this one in Preston is the first to be replaced. Without the new dam, PSD 1 would soon have been facing water shortages anyway, it was noted.
And we appreciate the work, Adams said, but we are at the middle of a firestorm of public criticism now and need help.
Backup plan
PSD 1 is already buying water from Clinton District and drawing from Blue Hole pond.
At the Kingwood meeting, PSD 1’s engineer, Richard Gaines of Stantec, asked Kingwood to consider emergency temporary connections.
The two-inch connections, with lines above ground, would not be permanent. The taps would be permanent. The idea is to have other sources available, if PSD 1 has water shortages again.
Gaines said PSD 1 is looking seriously at:
– W.Va. Morgan Mine Road, about 1,800 feet of line to serve 80-160 PSD 1 customers, for 8,000-16,000 gallons of water daily.
– Dogtown Road, 1,800 feet of line and 900 customers.
T
he district also looked at connections at Pell Road and Birds Creek Road, but there are pressure issues there, Gaines said.
“We don’t have any funding to do this at this point,” Gaines said. Nor do they think the water will be needed before next summer, he said.
Water Board Members Mike Loughry and Bill Robertson expressed concerns about the above ground lines. But, Board Member Perry Barlow said, “It’s no different than a meter for a customer. We put in a meter. It’s on them.”
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