DeKalb Boil Water Advisory Lifted
Decatur Metro | July 27, 2015 | 8:10 pmDeKalb County just sent out this message via Twitter…
DeKalb County just sent out this message via Twitter…
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darn, I just ordered a 500 gallon boiler.
Finally. I still say the county’s senior leadership has some ‘splainin to do.
What!? You mean the sky’s not falling!?
8:59 DeKalb Watershed site still has recinded it’s boil.
Whoa…..check out this story on Decaturish:
Email shows disagreement between contractor, county over water main fix
http://www.decaturish.com/2015/07/email-shows-disagreement-between-contractor-county-over-water-main-fix/
Thank you, DM, for keeping us up to date. I was beginning to get a little nervous.
Dekalb county has demonstrated its incompetence throughout this water fiasco. They lacked the technical expertise to fix the issue and the communication/crisis management expertise to communicate with county citizens.
This is not a minor issue to washed down the sink, it is clear indication of major issues in county management. As others have mentioned this impacted hospitals, ill/elderly residents, the business community in lost restaurant/business revenue, the workers in these businesses, etc.
Can we seriously explore merging with Fulton county or some other county and let a competent entity that is capable run the operations?
Our long nightmare is over… Oh wait we still live in Dekalb County.
This whole fiasco has been an example of just how broken DeKalb county is. In the rush to put every available parcel of land in DeKalb county into a city, the decline of the county will accelerate. I think some of us ignore county issues and just count our blessings that we are in Decatur but we all need to realize how vulnerable we are to the bad DeKalb county government. It’s time to consider the greater good.
+1
That’s exactly how I feel. People in municipalities tend to ignore the larger DeKalb issues as they don’t seem to feel affected by them. I think that’s a huge mistake and a horrible display of privilege. The rest of the county should matter to those within city limits. It affects crime and the larger infrastructure. The more stability there is county-wide, the less likely there is to be an uptick in crime. I hope this is a wake up call for the citizens of this county. Just pointing fingers at DeKalb County isn’t going to solve anything.
Had the break been inside the Decatur city limits, the repair remains a Dekalb County Watershed job. So yes, it’s foolish for CoD residents or any city to ignore the county issues.
Jbgotcha, could you please provide more perspective on how privilege is related to the competency of Dekalb government officials and personnel?
Perhaps a great display of privilege is the ability to display complete incompetence without regard to performance review.
I agree with your last sentence. The privilege I speak of is the privilege most people in municipalities enjoy by being able to ignore larger county issues. It seems only a fuss is raised when there is a personal inconvenience or municipal wide inconvenience. A lot of folks in Decatur, Brookhaven, Dunwoody, etc, don’t participate in putting pressure on the county government and have silently watched it decline for a decade or more. My comment was in support of the poster above that was expressing hope that this would get more people involved in helping reform this county government.
You have to keep in mind that a primary reason for creation of Brookhaven and Dunwoody and a suggested reason by the yet-to-be created municipalities is to remove themselves from the influence of the county. While, as you say, one cannot be divorced from many county functions, the mindset is the county be damned and that’s why they broke off. You must admit that the county has been less than kind to the cities, both new and old. For example, witness the 10 year battle with Decatur over HOST money and the long argument with Dunwoody over Brook Run park.
I’m well aware of the reasons for the cityhood movement. I just think it’s short sighted to think you can close yourself off from the rest of the county. The world around the city limits still affects the quality of life within the city. I wish people had a more inclusive attitude about DeKalb County. This goes back decades and there are lot of wounds that need to be healed. DeKalb hasn’t been that kind to the cities and I get that too. The government as a whole is immature and unproductive, but that can change with the right amount of pressure and with work toward bridging the gap between North and South DeKalb.
True that, but my point is that the cities became or will become cities because the citizens want to bury their heads in the sand and not be involved. It’s just another example of the parochialism that’s exited in all of the metro area (or all of Georgia for that matter) and it’s going to be very difficult to break the cycle.
There’s the added complication that counties were never supposed to be an urban governance model. County governments were established to provide basic administration and limited services to dispersed, rural populations. Density was intended for cities and towns, where higher populations could fund a greater level of services; compact development limited waste in infrastructure, and everyone’s relative proximity to each other helped ensure leadership responsive to the voice of its constituents.
This fell apart once counties started competing with cities and towns for development dollars. They did this by offering the good life on the cheap. Now we’re seeing what “on the cheap” gets you in the long haul.
(Not the only component in DeKalb’s mighty dysfunction, of course, but definitely an ingredient in the soup.)
Thank you jbgotcha.
The performance of Dekalb County as reflected by this situation is unacceptable. A broken water line resulted in life safety concerns, quality of life issues, and millions in economic losses by both residents and businesses across the county.
Went to Publix at Clairmont and N. Decatur last night around 8:30pm. Was a sight to behold. Water shelves were reminiscent of a walking dead episode. And the good folks who work there were hauling pallets of 2 gallon jugs up to the front.
Thanks DM! I relied on your site the entire time for updates since it was so difficult to find any information anywhere else. My big question though is: Why did so many people go out and buy water? It was really not a big deal to put on a pot of water and boil it. I really don’t get the shopping frenzy and all the plastic waste.
Many of us had no water to boil on Sunday.
There were long periods of time when there was no water at all, the system completely shut down & there was no water to boil. Unless you stockpiled water in your bathtub, sinks, buckets or other containers, purchasing drinking water was the only option, and that was an option only if you could afford to do so.
Sick child so the time and inconvenience of water boiling was the straw that might have broken this camel’s back. A reservoir of clean water was helpful.
Also, some people had water, but it was discolored and full of sediment. Some people weren’t comfortable drinking that, even if it had been boiled.
We bought some water to drink because the boiled water took a while to cool down.
Way too late to help this time, but if you have air conditioning odds are very good you have a source of water in your condensation unit. If your air handler (furnace) is in your basement you likely have a condensation pump. If it is in the attic, you may have a gravity tube or pipe that carries it to ground. Either way, in this heat you are likely producing inadvertently at least 5 gallons a day. Would still need to boil to drink but fine as is to flush.
Not sure I’d drink it even after boiling, but would work fine for non-potable uses. I have a bucket to catch mine anyway and use it for birdbath and to water plants.