Residents of the town of Alexandria have been complaining about the price and the quality of their water for over a year now, but after the last meeting of the newly elected Alexandria Board of Mayor and Aldermen, a solution is hopefully on its way.

Local resident Sherry Tubbs of High Street, Alexandria, reported that her water bill is triple the average water bill, and says her water is brown, like the color of coffee.

“This has been going on for about a year,” Tubbs told the Smithville Review. “From January, the whole month, it was brown, and we spent $225 on water. I came down and spoke to the water department, and she told me there was no leak and that it was somewhere on my property, and that I had to leave her office because I was being rude.” She said that incident happened in June 2023.

Tubbs said that she had someone look at her system, and even ran cameras down the pipes to look for leaks, and none were found. “He led me out to the corner and said, ‘Look at that. There’s a leak out here somewhere, and I wouldn’t be surprised if your neighbors are also having problems.’ I spoke with my neighbors and they told me their bills have also doubled or tripled in the last year. Something is going on out there.”

She says some months her bill can exceed $400. The year before that I had a bill at $700 for one month. The average water bill in Tennessee is about $40. In the meantime, Tubbs said she has to go to Walmart once a week to buy gallons of water for cooking.

The new mayor, Beth Tripp, said that while she has only recently taken office, she is looking into the complaints about the water system.

“Looking at our records, we had 160 calls and people writing in with complaints about the water and the water quality. The old board did nothing about it. The old board failed to get anyone in here to run water and sewer. The sewer plant has been out since June 28. They had over a month to get someone to run the water and sewer plant, for these residents, and they failed to do so.”

At the meeting, the Alexandria Board decided to accept a bid by Richard Potter of Brush Creek Environmental Management (BCEM), a company that had previously handled the water and sewer in Alexandria, but due to a contract dispute had not handled the system until last June.

“Caney Fork, when I started here in 2009, had about four parts per million of iron in the system,” Potter told the Review. “Now, it’s running at around 17 to 19 parts per million. It’s just like any mineral, like manganese, you’re going to see it. If you have a black ring around your commode, that is manganese. If you see brown, cloudy water, that’s iron.”

“I had to get my board (Smith Utility) to authorize a chemical that we’ve been using, polyphosphate, and that took some time. What it does, it doesn’t get rid of it, but it hides it. It will sequester the iron, manganese, and will protect from any biomass on any lines.” The city buys its water from Smith Utility in Smith County, where Potter is also the manager.

“In six months, we should be seeing an improvement. Unfortunately, it’s going to release itself, and we’re going to see a big blast of brown water, but after that, it will get gone and we’ll never see it again.”

As for the high bills, Potter said there may have been some mis-readings of meters, and that the cost may have been through estimated usage. Potter said that he knows where all the meters are, and that crews will work with residents to find leaks and meter problems.