Print

Email story

Comment

Email editor

Aloha must back talk with action

Aloha Utilities thinks Pasco County commissioners are disingenuous.

Pot, meet the black kettle. (Which just might not have been black before Aloha-provided water spilled into it.)

The private utility serving 15,000 customers in southwest Pasco has done little over the past decade to successfully resolve complaints about dark, smelly tap water. Its standard line is that it provides water meeting minimum government standards.

Yet, a company lawyer accused the county of being two-faced: Showing concern about the cost of a new treatment system while charging Aloha a bulk water rate significantly higher than the retail expense.

Typical subterfuge from the utility that promised in a 1997 newsletter that it hoped "in the next few weeks discolored water will be history," according to testimony at a public hearing Thursday.

The gripes remain eight years later. Leah Gibson showed commissioners the scum left in her 10-month-old son's bath tub. "It was like swamp water," she said. Susan Hendrick said her water is clear, but smells worse now that she replumbed her house, replacing copper pipes with PVC.

It's an imperative point. The utility and a publicly financed study indicate the source of the water quality problem is the chemical reaction between Aloha's water and copper pipes inside customers' homes. Hendrick's testimony contradicts the assumption that new piping will resolve the problems.

Thursday, Pasco County, with the blessing of the state Legislature, stepped in to referee. Commissioners correctly adopted an ordinance giving the monopoly three months to devise and schedule a permanent fix. The ordinance requires use of aeration technology to remove excessive hydrogen sulfide in the water delivered to customers, about 2,000 of whom have asked the state to be removed from Aloha's franchise area because of the poor water quality.

The ordinance also allows Aloha the ability to obtain a variance if it determines a better solution is available. That point mattered little to the utility, which argued the ordinance prevents it from using any technology that might be suggested in a consultant's report expected in the next 30 days.

The utility's previous scare tactics included a cost estimate of up to $14-million to devise a central aeration system. However, another consultant suggested the technology could be installed at the company's individual wells at a price of closer to $5-million. With the Public Service Commission's blessing, reasonable costs will be passed on to customers through rate increases.

"We intend to address the problem whether this ordinance goes into affect or not," Aloha attorney John Wharton said.

It's welcome news. Too bad it sounds familiar to the unfulfilled promises from 1997. We would have more confidence in the utility's sincerity if Aloha had attached a definitive time frame to the declaration.

Instead, Wharton indicated the utility likely will appeal the county's ordinance to the state Division of Administrative Hearings. It is yet another stall tactic that demonstrates little regard for the consumers.

Aloha shouldn't delay. It should provide clear, odor-free water to its customers, or it should let somebody else do it.

[Last modified June 19, 2005, 00:38:17]