Heavy rains in the Harrisonburg area have washed large amounts of sediment into the city's raw water supply, prompting a mandatory water conservation notice and a local emergency declaration. WMRA's Randi B. Hagi reports.
The Harrisonburg City Council held a special meeting Friday afternoon, where they approved a local emergency declaration due to the effects of severe weather on the water treatment plant. While city leaders said the water currently coming out of the taps is safe to drink and use, they have instituted a mandatory water conservation notice, asking community members to reduce non-essential water use, through actions like taking shorter showers and not watering their lawns or gardens.
According to the National Weather Service, parts of Harrisonburg and Rockingham County have received more than two and a half inches of rain in the last 72 hours. This washed large amounts of sediment into the city's water treatment system, and public utilities workers have struggled to clean that water since the morning of May 14th.
City Manager Ande Banks read an overview of the crisis in the declaration.
ANDE BANKS: This triggered a complete plant shutdown and no production of new potable water for 24 hours, and a need to rely on the city's potable water storage and Rockingham County's potable water. Water production at the water treatment plant was partially restored beginning May 15 by using different treatment techniques, however the turbidity's continued lack of responsiveness to traditional chemical treatment techniques limits the ability to fully restore production.
"Turbidity" describes the amount of particles suspended in the water – and that measure is still too high.
BANKS: As of the morning of May 16, the city's water supply in storage is greatly diminished, and Rockingham County can no longer assist the city with supplying potable water to city customers. Additional high turbidity water could enter our system due to the prediction of more heavy rain over the next several days.
The local emergency declaration streamlines the procurement process the municipality has to follow for obtaining things like extra materials or labor at the treatment plant, or, in the case of a dire shortage, bottled water for distribution to the community.
Mike Collins, the director of public utilities, explained that both of the city's raw water sources – the North and Dry rivers – have been affected by large amounts of –
MIKE COLLINS: … materials like silt, clay, organics, inorganics materials that are present in our water.
He said their typical chemical treatment process for removing these particles has not been as effective as usual, especially since the repeated rains keep reintroducing more sediment into the water supply.
The Encyclopedia Britannica explains that water treatment systems typically introduce a chemical coagulant into the water to bring small suspended particles together in larger masses so they can be removed. The city's Raw Water Supply Management Plan notes that the North River has been historically susceptible to a wide range in turbidity that requires heavier use of coagulation chemicals.
COLLINS: To retain our safe drinking water status, we've had to either interrupt or reduce the output from the water treatment plant beginning May 15th.
Michael Parks, Harrisonburg's director of communications and public engagement, said they currently have between seven and eight million gallons of already-treated water in storage.
MICHAEL PARKS: We typically have 17 million gallons in storage at one time, and on a traditional day in the city, we would use 10 to 12 million gallons. … The plant is functioning at a reduced limit. We are treating water. We are keeping up with that 7 to 8 million gallons in storage, but it's very important that we keep these conservation measures in place, because if something were to change, we could run out of that water supply very quickly.
Rockingham County did give some of their excess water to the city, but that assistance has run out. Parks said he was not aware of any other localities in the region that had been affected to this degree, either because of where and how the rain fell, or because some – like Rockingham County – rely on groundwater sources, in contrast to the surface water the city gets from rivers.
PARKS: We have reached out to all of our local heavy users of our water system to advise them of what is taking place, and let them know that there could be a possibility where we would ask more of them. … Some businesses have their own water storage onsite. Some use reclaimed water … and everyone that we've spoken to has been very mindful of their impacts on our local water supply, and we're grateful for that.
He said that included James Madison University, which is in the midst of graduation celebrations, and agricultural and industrial businesses in town.
Following the emergency declaration vote, city council members including Laura Dent thanked city staff for responding to the crisis and community members for not wasting water.
LAURA DENT: To reiterate, the water is safe to drink, it's just the more we can conserve, the more readily we can bring the whole water treatment system back online.
The city will continue to post updates on their Facebook and X, or Twitter, pages. For WMRA News, I'm Randi B. Hagi.
