[HollyMutual-Announce] New issue and follow-up to previous email

[Holly Mutual Water Company]

All:

Around 1:00 pm this afternoon there was evidence that the Holly Mutual water distribution system was slowly being re-pressurized, when it should have been off since 10:00 am in the morning. Colorado Water Well (CWW) was immediately called in, and shortly afterwards confirmed that no Holly Mutual distribution pump was operating, and therefore was not causing this problem. At that time the distribution pressure was about 25 psi at the Piedmont well, and should have been closer to zero. I don't have a pressure meter on hand, but the Holly Mutual water pressure for my property continued to rise after CWW departed.

This is very concerning, because it suggests there is a mechanism outside of the Holly Mutual system that is feeding water into our pipeline. The simplest explanation is that there is a cross-connection between Denver Water and Holly Mutual, and when Holly Mutual is not pressurizing its distribution lines, Denver Water is entering the Holly Mutual lines. Any such cross-connection is prohibited by the contract that Holly Mutual, and thus all properties, signed with Denver Water in the year 2000, as a prerequisite for the Denver Water installation in this neighborhood. The ONLY permissible manner that a property can use both Denver Water and Holly Mutual for irrigation is that there must always be an air gap between the two supplying systems. A swing valve, whereby a pipe is manually 'swung' between the two systems and can only be connected to one at a time, is permitted. Piped-in valves and backflow prevention devices that effect a cross-connection are not.

If any property is feeding the Holly Mutual system through a cross-connection, the amount of water involved could be considerable, because Denver Water's water pressure is generally higher than Holly Mutual's. That property would be entirely responsible for this cost. CWW mentioned they were aware of a analogous situation where a property was required to pay for around one million gallons of water. If you have a dual use irrigation system, it is highly recommended that you verify that it is legally set up and functioning properly. If this distribution problem continues, Holly Mutual will likely be forced to investigate and this will involve considerable effort and cost.

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Separately, Holly Mutual's recent reduction in distribution hours was not enough to prevent the Piedmont Well from running dry each night. This is not surprising, given the hot weather we are experiencing and the design limits of the Piedmont Well, while the Whitehall Well is undergoing repairs. What is disturbing is that we have been running out of water in as little as 3-4 hours each night. This is significantly less than the Piedmont Well's capacity that assumes every property is only watering during their two assigned nights per week. Unfortunately the simplest explanation is that some properties are using Holly Mutual water on more than two nights per week without authorization. The effect of this is that everyone gets less water. This has been an issue in the past, and the Holly Mutual Board has considered fines and disconnection as consequences, but we continue to hope that property owners will act responsibly. Please ensure you are using Holly Mutual water only on 
your two assigned nights each week.

One of the problems of running out of water early each night is that we lose that time for filling Piedmont's storage tank. The water is lost dribbling out of irrigation systems at an unusable pressure, which only serves to 'puddle' small areas. Our only choice was to further reduce the distribution hours from seven to five hours per night and change the distribution times from 5:00 - 10:00 am. CWW has implemented this and we hope that property owners will help us by using our reduced capacity only twice a week. However if the 'cheating' instead expands, we could be taken to the point where there is so much demand on our system, that we simply cannot provide any water until Whitehall comes back online.

Managing all of these crises is consuming a large amount of my time. I am sorry I have to write these emails, but there appears to be no other alternative.

Cheers,
Mark Derbyshire

President, Holly Mutual Water