Today’s speech is by Oro Valley resident, Bill Gardner.
Bill Gardner – Doubling the pressure in a 35-year old water pipe
“I’m a 32 year resident and my house is Ground Zero. Regarding water, WLB has never given us any specifics as to how this is going to be done. All we’ve been told is that we have no recourse in this regard….Our water line runs from Oracle Road at the intersection all the way up to the hotel at the top of our development. That's a mile. It’s a 35-year old pipe and 6 inches in diameter. I think we’re owed an explanation as to how you can come in and double, if not triple, the pressure in that pipe to pump the water down to this new development and also possibly to Area 3. We’d like to have an independent hydrologist come in and tell us how it’s going to be done. I think that's only fair. We’ve never been told how it’s going to be done.
Secondly, who’s going to do the work? A subcontractor to Richmond American.
Our roads are private and it was established at the Planning and Zoning Commission that you couldn’t use them to access this development as a road, yet somebody can come in and tear up our roads and our common area and we don’t even get formally asked.
Third, if anything goes wrong, who’s responsible? We’d like to see some sort of contract or agreement in place before the work starts so if this thing goes south (with water problems)…Who do we call? Who’s in charge? Is it the city, Oro Valley Water, Richmond America, or is it the subcontractor? I think this all needs to be sorted out. We want to make sure that our 7 irrigation lines are not affected by this. Nobody has mentioned sewers. We want to make sure that this thing does not cause any problems with our sewer system when you come in and dig up our roads.
I realize we can’t have all these answers now, but I certainly request as a resident of our community that somebody come and explain all this and give us a good solid legal and hydraulic engineering explanation.”
