March 6, 2009
Hello Kachess Community Members,
Our water committee has been very active over the winter and I have much to report concerning our
water system.
The leak that occurred last month was found but unfortunately, not until after we spent over $2000
finding it. The leak was caused by a property owner not the main system. We have a pretty good
system in place for finding and isolating leaks but if the leak is located anywhere after the valves by
the street that feed each residence, we still struggle. Individual meters are our only solution for this
Earlier in the winter, we had another leak caused by frozen pipes in a residence. It must be noted
that the last two leaks would not have been prevented by a new water system. It’s also important to
point out, however, that a new water system with all of the monitoring capabilities will not only reduce
the possibilities of a major system failure to near 0%, it will allow us to find leaks of nearly ever size,
including those on private property, much sooner and for a lot less money.
The water committee’s goal has been to gather enough data and draw up plans to be able to submit
to our membership a complete and thorough proposal to replace the water system. Parallel to this
monumental effort they have had an additional goal of maintaining the system and keeping the water
flowing until the system is replaced.
Last year’s budget allowed for us to contract with an engineering company to draw up a complete set
of plans and specifications so that we can get accurate proposals from contractors. We also had
money in the budget to install monitoring equipment that would give us early detection of a leak.
(Keep in mind that up until now, the only way to know that we had a leak, short of observing it, was
to either run out of water in the tanks, or to monitor the pump usage. If we noticed an increase in
usage, we would then have to climb the water tower ladder and look inside. Try doing that in
February. We would either find a volunteer that we haven’t burned out or we would have to pay our
water manager to do it.)
The engineering plans and specifications are nearly complete. From what we have reviewed, they
are fantastic. This is the same company that handled the drainage problems we had a couple of
years ago.
The next step is to get a few bids so we know what our costs are going to be. Once we have the
costs, we will present to the community the entire plan. We don’t know how the community will work
this out. Ultimately, it’s you that shall decide. It looks like getting a loan may be more difficult than
we thought. This means we may do a one time assessment and get the job done or multiple
assessments which ease everyone’s cash flow and save up the money in reserve so we can pay
cash. Saving cash flow is great but the down side is we risk more shut downs, volunteer burnout
and higher prices to complete the project.
Here’s some absolutely wonderful news!!! The water system monitoring equipment was installed
these past few days. Now, we will be able to electronically read the amount of water (in gallons per
minute) being pumped from the pump house to the tanks in real-time. In addition, we will able to see
the amount of water in the water tanks in inches, and compute the exact amount of water used
during any given period of time. For instance, we know that a one inch of drop or rise equals 612
gallons of water. We will be able to tell if we are keeping up with a leak or if we are losing the battle.
In addition, we will be able, for the first time, to determine the water leakage in our distribution
system by taking a reading of the amount of inches of water in the tank at say, 1:00AM on a Monday
morning. We can then take another reading at 4:00AM. Assuming that no one is using water
between this three-hour period any drop in the level of water would indicate loss from leakage in our
distribution system.
Chlorine monitoring is a key requirement by DOH for customer safety. We will now be able to see
the exact amount of free chlorine in the systems in real-time. Our goal is to maintain a level of
1.5ppm - .5ppm. By connecting to system via a computer, we can see the exact ppm of chlorine in
the system. In addition, this information is logged every 5 minutes and put into an Excel spreadsheet
for compliance purposes. This information is accessible any time but will be sent to the water
committee in Excel format every day at 6:00 AM.
We have set up parameters for system alarms, which will send our volunteers an email and cell
phone text message, if any of the defined parameters for the water tank level or chlorine levels are
crossed. This will allow us to proactively manage our water supply in a way never before possible.
All of this helps us manage our fragile system more easily and will reduce the chances for outages.
There is comfort in knowing that we are making it easier on the volunteers but please do not infer
that these steps that we are taking in the monitoring system make the overall problem of our failing
system go away. Even though maintenance on our water collection system last fall resulted in more
water available to us, a major leak that is not found can still cause us to run out of water. All of the
alarms, e-mail messages and phone calls the system can provide cannot fix a leak. Sure, we’ll know
about it sooner and once we find it, we can isolate it and repair it. Depending on the point of
breakage, this isolation could affect many or just a few.
Let me be clear: in concert with the water committee, it is the board’s position that we need to
replace the entire water distribution system as soon as we can possibly raise the funds.
Finally, I have many people to thank. First, I’d like to thank Bob Angrisano who was instrumental in
getting the monitoring system specified and installed. He has untold hours invested in our water
system. Bill Campbell, a relatively new member and full time resident at Kachess has been very
helpful in the manual readings recently. Scott Nicholson has been a fixture and key water committee
supporter for many, many years. Ken Kemp and his son, Spencer, have both contributed much to
the leak detection issues, water replenishment and they also helped with the monitoring system
installation. Lastly, Scott Walker, Andy Dulin and Howard Ringoen, all board members and water
committee members, have done a fantastic job with overseeing the entire project and have provided
much documentation and organization skills to aid those who follow in their footsteps.
We also owe much gratitude to our two key paid service providers; Randy Hoffine and Dan
& Carol Riblett. They do what our volunteers cannot.
Please watch out for our annual board meeting announcement. We’ll have a lot to talk about and
much on which to vote. Stay tuned.
If you have any questions, please shoot me an e-mail or come to a board meeting.
Thanks.
Tom Carmody
Kachess Board President
president@kachess.com
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