Water main break near water treatment plant in Groveland repaired

The City of Groveland reported a large water main break near the Sunshine Water Treatment Plant on Tuesday morning.

It has since been repaired.

The incident caused lower-than-normal water pressure across the plant’s service area, officials said Tuesday morning.

The city said crews responded to the break and worked to make the repairs.

Residents along Cherry Lake Road, State Road 19, Wilson Lake Parkway, and U.S. 27 may experience low water pressure until crews resolve the issue.

The city issued a precautionary boil water advisory while work was underway.

“I was like really we’re going to do this again?” resident Kim Amato sed of getting the third boil water advisory in three weeks.

“Just makes me madder,” said resident Todd Richard.

The boil water advisory was affecting about 3,500 homes Tuesday and leaving residents frustrated as city officials work to address ongoing water system issues.

“It feels like there’s no reprieve, yet we’re still being faced with increases in the monthly bills,” Richard said.

The city council suspended a planned water rate increase on Monday night due to the ongoing issues, according to the mayor.

“That’s great and all, but we’re still facing it, and yet we still have these issues that keep popping up,” Richard said.

The water main was repaired before 7 p.m. Tuesday, but water samples still need to be tested, meaning the earliest the boil water advisory could be lifted is Thursday.

“Hopefully they will figure out a solution to the problem, and we won’t have to keep on doing this,” Amato said.

The city’s public works director said they are working on both short-term and long-term fixes. He announced that the city has received a $7.8 million grant from the state to address issues at the Sunshine Water Plant. Additionally, construction of a new water treatment plant is underway.

“Had that plant been online today, there would have been no disruption for our residents. Those two things, the plant here and that new facility, that’s what we’re doing about it, and that’s what our customers’ rates are paying into,” T.J. Fish, the public works director, said.

For many residents, relief from these repeated issues cannot come soon enough.

“We can’t keep doing this. This is just unsustainable,” Richard said.

The first sample of water will be pulled at 8 p.m. Tuesday night, with the second round of samples to be pulled at 8 a.m. on Wednesday.

“We’re expecting the results from the first and second rounds of testing Thursday,” city officials said. “If the samples comes back clean, the city’s northern service area could see the precautionary boil water advisory lifted.”

Officials said they are confident the repairs will be complete by Tuesday evening.

They provided an update during a news conference Tuesday at 2:30 p.m.

>> Watch the full news conference in the video player below.

Third time

This is the third issue the city has experienced in September.

Last week, the city issued a boil water advisory for 13 Groveland neighborhoods after the outage.

Previously, the city experienced a pump failure at the Sunshine Water Plant that affected roughly 5,000 residents.