Published: December 28, 2007 10:10 pm      

Eureka Hollow community voices water concerns

ECKMAN — Robert Holland came home to Eureka Hollow in Eckman for Christmas to spend some time with his mother and the water was off.

“My mom pays her water bills faithfully and expects to have service,” Holland said. “The water has been on and off for the past month. It’s not just her house. It’s the same for every house in Eureka Hollow. My mom’s very old, and I’d like for her to be as comfortable as she can be.”

According to Holland, his mother had been served in the past by Kimball Light & Power, but the McDowell County Public Service District took over operation of the lines in the summer.

“There are several people in this area who have the same problem,” he said. “The service people that they send out here don’t seem to know what they’re doing.”

Mavis Brewster, office manager of the McDowell PSD said that she understands the frustration from customers who have experienced interruptions in their water service. “We tried to find the problems in the existing line to that area, but we couldn’t,” Brewster said. “We’re replacing the line up there to those customers and we should have it done (Friday) afternoon.

“The lines up there were installed by the coal companies in the 1930s and 40s,” Brewster said. “We’re working to replace lines were we have to and to fix the entire system. It’s a slow process. We’re working with a very old system and we have almost 3,000 customers.”

Brewster said that the absence of mapping of the existing service lines makes the situation even more challenging. “In some places, you just have to go in there with shovels and search for the lines,” she said.

“The state Public Service Commission asked us to take over operations of these lines on July 19,” Brewster said. “We have advertised for an engineer,” she said, adding that the PSD should be able to announce the new engineer on Jan. 8.

The public spokesperson for the state PSC listed on the agency’s web site could not be reached for comment. Calls to the telephone listing for Kimball Light & Water Co., in the telephone directory result in a recording indicating that the line has been disconnected.

— Contact Bill Archer at barcher@bdtonline.com