MORGANTOWN — The state Public Service Commission is reviewing a set of proposed rules for testing fire hydrants submitted by a task force. The PSC’s Consumer Advocate Division offered its endorsement of the rules this week, and a state delegate who played a driving role in the statewide effort suggested some tweaks.
The PSC opened a general investigation into hydrant safety in June 2023 at the request of the governor, following a Charleston house fire where three hydrants in the vicinity couldn’t produce a flow of water to deal with the fire. It then created the Fire Hydrant Maintenance and Testing Task Force in March and charged it with crafting rules for maintenance and testing.
The task force submitted the proposed rules on July 1. PSC’s survey revealed there are 49,906 hydrants across the state, with 95% operated by utilities and 5% in private hands. Morgantown Utility Board has 557 hydrants, with 226 older than 50 years old, and another 219 it doesn’t know the age of because they came to MUB through acquiring other water systems. MUB doesn’t know the whole amount of privately owned hydrants but is aware of 103.
Utilities would have 12 months from the rules’ effective date to inspect all public fire hydrants and would have to inspect them annually thereafter.
Two organizations — the American Water Works Association and the National Fire Protection Association — set practices and standards for hydrants, including flow testing. Utilities would be required to follow those and, where conflicts exist, choose one or the other.
Utilities would be required to maintain complete records for each public hydrant and file annual reports with the PSC.
There are two methods of flow testing, using either one or two hydrants, and utilities are free to choose which method they use.
CAD said this week that the two-hydrant method is the best, but the one-hydrant method is easier, requires less manpower and is preferred by some task force participants. And the one-hydrant method provides for the quickest means to get all hydrants tested.
“The public depends on reliable working fire hydrants to protect their homes and businesses,” CAD said. “The sooner an appropriate baseline can be determined for all fire hydrants, the better. And the identification and marking of non-working or deficient hydrants is the first order of business.
“CAD believes that the rule embodies a reasonable and appropriate compromise,” it said. “The single hydrant test can represent a minimum baseline test which should be performed on every hydrant at least every five years, and the more selective testing of multiple hydrants can be performed as needed, or on request. It is our opinion that the appropriate use of both testing methodologies, when deemed necessary, best promotes the overall public interest in having safe and reliable fire service throughout the state.”
Delegate Daniel Linville, R-Cabell, chairs the House Technology and Infrastructure Committee.
He submitted comments on the proposed rules this week. He first cautioned that the PSC should carefully review any proposal by a utility to recover costs incurred by abiding by the rules.
“It is incumbent that the public not be subjected to unreasonable charges by rate-regulated monopolies for essential services,” he said.
The rules are silent on liability, he said, but he hopes that they wouldn’t be changed to either absolve utilities from liability or create any new liability.
Linville noted that the rules allow fire departments to participate in flow testing and require 911 call centers to be notified of changes in hydrant status within 24 hours, but said the rules should require the call centers to notify the relevant fire departments of changes.
He said utilities should not be allowed to downgrade hydrants based on their flow rates. “We should not accept that a hydrant be simply downgraded in its flow rating to a sub-standard hydrant, instead of seeing that hydrant adequately repaired or maintained.”
And, he concluded, utilities should not be permitted to eliminate hydrants, or be prevented from replacing or moving them, regardless of the size of the pipes feeding them.
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