A miscalculation by the manager of the city water plant that brought a Nashville TV station to town last week looking for a story will not change the fact that city officials must soon decide whether to hire a firm to find Smithville’s water leaks or buy the equipment themselves.
In his monthly report to the mayor and board of aldermen last week, Todd Bowman, supervisor of the city’s water treatment plant, informed the city council that the recent repair of a major leak has not stopped water loss.
“Theoretically each month, you should pump about the same amount of water and you should meter out the same amount unless you have new businesses or industries come in,” he said.
“If you look at November 2011, you can see the amount of water was at 47.9 million gallons. In November 2012 is was 49.7 million gallons. That's when I noticed we had a leak,” Bowman continued.
“In December 2011 it was 49 million, and December 2012 it was 54.8 million. Then they found the big leak and fixed it at the end of January.”
Bowman said the amount of water pumped from the city facility has increased at a time when consumption should be down.
“In January 2012 it was 49 million and January 2013 it was 56.4 million. In February 2012 it was 46.1 million and February 2013 it was 50 million,” he said.
“We're up to about two-million gallons per day. When I started we were at 1.7 million per day. You can just gradually see the water ramping up and it should be vice versa right now. In the winter it should fall down and pick back up in the spring. If it stays like this we'll be pumping up to 60 million gallons (per month) by summer,” Bowman noted.
As it turns out, a miscalculation in Bowman’s numbers apparently made the problem look worse than it is.
In a meeting with the Review Monday, Bowman said the plant actually pumped an average of 1.8 million gallons per day in August, and that number is up only slightly from previous years, with the 2011 per-day average for that month at 1.6 million gallons, and the 2012 daily average at 1.7 million.
“I made a mathematical error on the 2013 daily report for August,” Bowman said. “ It is not two-million gallons, it is 1.8 million.”
The water plant manager also said that the percentage of water loss was in line with other utilities, and while it has grown from 18 percent to 22 percent in the last year, it is still well under the 35 percent loss the state requires.
An audit performed for water loss in 2010 showed that the City of Alexandria was at 37 percent, DeKalb Utility District losses stood at a little over 27 percent for the year.
Bowman told the mayor and aldermen at last week’s meeting of the city council that  he had contacted a firm who could locate the problem.
“We have talked to a leak-survey guy who said he could come in and do the whole system and the whole 54 mile of main for $5,600,” he told the council.
“He will walk every main in the city. He will spot the leaks and put an ‘x’ on the road and then you have the guys go out and repair the leaks.”
While the city already owns outdated leak-detecting equipment, it is apparently no longer reliable.
Up-to-date equipment can reportedly be purchased for approximately $2,600.
Mayor Jimmy Poss said he preferred buying new equipment.
“There’s another way we can go on this. We've talked about buying this equipment. We've got one leak detector. It’s older and not as good. It won't detect like this new equipment. I'd like to buy it. We've got the people to do it. I’ll go out there and walk the lines with it if I need to,”  the mayor said.