Recently the Riverside Highland Water Company sent out an announcement to local residents of Grand Terrace. This announcement informed residents that the company had found levels of coliform bacteria above the drinking water standards. These levels were in violation of the drinking water standard.
However, the notice was sent out to residents to make them aware of the situation, not to alarm them. The levels were non-emergency and the situation was handled as soon as the levels became apparent.
Riverside Highland Water Company samples and tests all active water wells and the water distribution system according to all Federal EPA and State of California regulations. They also have procedures in place under the direction of the EPA and the State if a sample tests positive.
In an interview with Don Hough, General Manager at Riverside Highland Water Company he said, ”In the month of May, we did have two coliform bacteria samples that showed the presence of total coliform bacteria. While large systems that take more than 40 samples per month may have as much as 5 percent coliform positive, the standard for a water system our size is that no more than 1 sample per month may do so.” Hough also stated, “After we received the results of the positive tests, we resample both sites as well as samples taken upstream and downstream of the sites that were all negative.”
The company believes that the cause of the bacteria could have been from a water well that may have what the water industry refers to as iron bacteria which is a naturally organic bacterium. This is not unusual for wells and there are various treatment techniques that are available.
The problem is that sometimes the iron bacterium comes back even years after treatment. This was the case here. Hough stated, “While iron bacteria are not harmful to people we understand that since this well has had issues in the past we chose to take it out of service.”
Riverside Highland Water Company has a computer system, SCADA which stands for Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition, that continually monitors the wells, booster stations and reservoirs and has the capability to notify us if a problem arises. Every day they have an employee that physically stops at every site, including weekends and holiday to make sure there are no issues or problems.
While the company does many things to try and ensure there will be no problems, problems sometime occur. Water wells can produce bacteria or other contaminates that may be in the aquifer. Power outages may create health issues, reservoirs age and pipes leak. Riverside Highland Water Company has a comprehensive capital Improvement plan that has been in place since 1986. They are currently going through the approval process to drill a new well.
Two years ago, they recoated the inside of our largest reservoir and will recoat another this coming winter. The company has replaced about 70 percent of the original water system and now have large portable generators that can operate the wells and booster pumps when there is no electricity.
While no water system is perfect, and the company is disappointed in the two positive samples, Riverside Highland Water Company will continue to do all they can to provide the highest quality water at the most reasonable costs with excellent customer service we can.
Hough wants to assure residents that, “Riverside Highland Water Company works diligently to provide quality water to our customers and shareholders.”