No water - again. The McDowell County PSD fiasco continues

Unfortunately the "lack of water in winter issue", since Mavis Brewster & the McDowell County PSD (Public Service District) took over our water supply, is still alive and well in McDowell County.
Those of you who saw the first post on this blog last January, may recall that the county was without water for 26 days until the media came & "miraculously" got us our water back. At the time I took & posted photos of Dan shooting a water line across the creek with a bow & arrow, something he wound up doing 6 times last winter. It seemed humorous the first time, but less and less humorous as he had to do it again and again, as the McDowell County PSD repeatedly let the water pressure drop so low that there was no way to keep the water from freezing. And now it is humorous no longer. It is a criminal fiasco of epic proportions. We are not living in the "3rd world"- and yet we are.

Today- for the 5th time in the last month- we lost water again, literally watching it go from a full flow to nothing. This time the McDowell County PSD's excuse- relayed to us by the 911 personnel, as no one answered the telephone at the PSD- was that the ENTIRE COUNTY was without water, so at least we know 100% we're not alone. A few days ago we were in the kitchen at 3 a.m., when the tap water (running full force, as we now have to let it do all winter), slowed to a trickle, and then stopped. Mavis Brewster of the McDowell County PSD was not only in absolute denial that there was anything wrong- as always- she lied to us repeatedly. When we called her she expressed-again- disbelief- that we had no water, saying that we are the "only" people who called to report not having water, something she states every single time we call to report that we have no water, when it is known across WV that most of McDowell County is now often without water during the winter.
We had to cancel weekend reservations for the Inn, and on Friday, Jan. 16 we again turned away guests because we had no water. We then learned that the local motel was closed as well; there was literally no lodging available for these tourists anywhere in the county!

This is not only grotesquely embarrassing for the county, it is humiliating to the State of West Virginia.

That time we had no water for 5 days- until my husband, Dan- aged 62 with a bad back and an aneurysm- was able to dig a trench and lay yet another water line. He has not yet been able to complete the project as the weather has been too cold, and as a result of this we are now also dealing with busted pipes, resultant flooding, and at least one toilet that must be replaced. We hold the McDowell County PSD and Mavis Brewster personally and totally responsible for this entire fiasco and all its costs, both physical and financial.

Mavis Brewster of the McDowell County PSD twice told us that "someone was coming to check the meter to see if there was water pressure" and told Dan that this had been done and that there was "nothing wrong" with it. Not only did we never see anyone from the McDowell county PSD on our property, but in the process of working on our water line again, Dan opened the meter and there was a hole in it with water shooting out!
This winter the no-water situation, coupled with the lies and refusal to rectify it, has been devastating- and this was NOT the case when Kimball Water controlled our water for the first 5 years of our lives here.
I again emailed everyone I could think of in the WV media and the Rural Water Association, as I still have a glimmer of hope that they can put sufficient pressure on Ms. Brewster and the McDowell County PSD to rectify this fiasco. If you would like to help, and know of appropriate people to contact and to forward this blog post to, please do so.
Sincerely,
Elisse Clark

Journalists make the water run!

I know now, 100%, that journalists make the water run!
Dan may make the sun shine and stars glow, but journalists make the water run!
Thanks to Charles Owens of the Bluefield Daily Telegraph, and Jessica Lilly of CBS WVNS-TV News59, we have running water- and the best water pressure we've had in years!
My hope is that "we are not alone", as they say...

Lemmee tell you: 28 days with no or negligable water pressure & $500+ in lost bookings was enough to make a girl want to slam her pretty little head into a wall.
And nothing- & I do mean Nothing- fixed it.
Not Dan "McGuyver" Clark with his bow & arrow, blow torch, pipe fittings, insulation, & bag of other magic tricks, crawling under the building to repeatedly check for non-existant leaks & running back and forth from The Water Source to The Inn trying to figure out how to fix the unfixable; nor my desperate, pleading phone calls to the McDowell County PSD, McD Co. Commissioners, Rural Water Association, et al: NOTHING.
Nada.
Finally, in sheer, unadultered desparation, I emailed The Journalists- and two Truly came to the rescue, actually braving the elements to make the Trek down to McDowell County to film & photograph The Trickle... and by 10p.m. That Very Night we not only had running water, we had RUNNING WATER! I mean like serious, freakin' water pressure!
This was cause for a truly joyous Woo-Hoo, Yee-Ha, Bubble Bath Fiesta at the Elkhorn Inn!
I must say, we truly do Love our antique clawfoot bathtubs! All 6 of them!
My only hope is that they were able to make the water run throughout McDowell County...
Bless their hearts- truly.
Elisse & Dan

A Water Story...

The pictures below tell a story. Look at the pictures and see if you can figure out the story. Then scroll below and read the story and see if you were right!

Once upon a time, in a land far, far away, there lived a Prince and his Princess in a Big, Old Castle*. The Castle was on one side of a creek, but the water meter for the Castle was on the other side of the creek. For five years the Prince and Princess had asked the various Kingdom Water Companies to move the meter over to the Castle where it belonged, but you know how Kingdom bureaucrats are! So for five years the Castle had a Big Hose that draped over the creek and brought water to the Castle. This didn't look very Princely, and it gets so cold in the Kingdom in the winter that their first winter in the Castle the water froze in the Big Hose and the Prince had to go thaw it with a blow torch. The Prince repeatedly replaced the Big Hose, once by tying it to a rock and flinging it over the creek to the Princess (the Prince has pretty good upper-body strength), and once by getting down into the creek (which made the Princess scream). The Prince insulated the hose, wrapping it in foam, putting it in a white plastic pipe, and all sorts of other magic things, but in the winter they always left the water running a bit in the Castle so the Big Hose wouldn't freeze and there would be running water for the guests from Far Away who came and paid to stay in the castle. And then one night, right before New Year's Eve, when it was very cold and snowing, the water in the Castle just stopped.
The Prince & Princess had guests in the Castle that night, and when the the guests arose in the morning, they found that they couldn't bathe or brush their teeth, and the Prince and Princess couldn't even make coffee for them before their departure! This was a Very Bad Thing,.as the Prince & Princess depended on their Castle's income to keep them out of the Poor House.
The Prince and Princess made many telephone calls to the Kingdom's Water Provider, but none were returned. They then learned that the Kingdom's Water Provider had a Big Problem, for many other people in the Kingdom were without water, as well. But when the Princess finally reached the Manager of the Water Provider, she was told that it was their problem- that even with the Castle taps running, the water must somehow have frozen in their Big Hose, and they would either have to replace the Big Hose themselves (in 18 degree cold during a snowstorm) or "wait until the temperature rose and the hose defrosted itself".
The Princess nicely explained that this Problem was the Water Provider's responsibility, as they'd already had 5 years to move the meter across the creek to the Castle, and that the Water Provider must have let the pressure get too low again for it to have frozen, even with the Castle's taps running, but the Water Provider kept repeating a passage from her Guide Book to the Princess, insisting that they didn't have to do anything. The Princess then actually begged for help putting a new hose across the creek, explaining that she had had a heart attack, and that the Prince had ruptured discs and a pinched nerve in his back and was in a lot of pain, but the Manager just read from her script again, word for word. The Prince and Princess waited, in the hope that someone would come to help them, but no one ever did.
Naturally, the Prince and Princess didn't want to stay dirty until the spring thaw, so the Prince went to Wal-Mart and bought a very long, green garden hose.

Then he fetched the Castle's fishing pole, and taped the end of the fishing line to the golden head of a magic, red arrow (1).

Then he jammed the fishing pole into the waistband of his jeans (2),

and he and the Princess, clad in Very Warm Clothing, went outside in back of the Castle (3),

whereupon the Prince shot the arrow across the half-frozen creek with his hunting bow! (4)

Then the Prince (whom the Princess- and a few other people- refer to as "McGuyver") cut the fishing line from the pole & tied the end to a rope (5),

and the Princess tied the rope to the garden hose, and the Prince went to the other side of the creek and found the magic arrow (6),

and pulled the hose across the creek (7, 8), and connected it to the water meter.
And that is how the Castle got it's water back!
And then Lo! The Prince and the Princess Bathed, with much Pomp (& bubble bath) and great gladness in their hearts, and they washed dishes and did laundry with great joy, and clad themselves in clean & festive garments, and there was merrymaking throughout the Castle, after which the Prince took a bunch of Tylenol.

But the water froze in the Big Hose the next day Again, because the pressure was too low, and Prince "McGuyver" went out there with his bow & arrow & fishing rod & another damn garden hose & did it again.
And again.
And again.
And the Princess, who by this time was truly ready to slam her head into a wall, e-mailed everyone she could think of (including the newspaper journalist) in the hopes that Someone in the Kingdom would give a hoot & McDowell County (oops- The Kingdom!) might see running water before the tulips came up & Wal-Mart ran out of Tylenol.
And so they lived happily ever after!
The End!

*The Castle is the Elkhorn Inn & Theatre, in Landgraff, West Virginia: www.elkhorninnwv.com