MONROE – Their mobile home sits in the middle of the woods, a peaceful haven for Jamie Orberg, 50, and his five children.
The family has lived there for about 17 years inexpensively, in part thanks to cheap water – about $20 per month – from a community water system in the Rimrock neighborhood that supports 57 homes.
Little did Orberg or his neighbors know that the water system, built in 1976, has been inching toward failure and soon will be abandoned like any of the broken-down cars left scattered throughout the area.
The community held meetings this year to discuss what to do when the system’s owner abandons their water system next spring.
Orberg attended none of those meetings.
“I have not really faced it,” he said.
But others in the community are facing the inevitable. So much so, that now a sign hangs on the community bulletin board on Rimrock Road advertising the services of a well-drilling company. One by one, residents have started drilling their own wells.
Drilling a well costs a homeowner $20,000 to $30,000 because contractors need to drill hundreds of feet into the rocky ground to reach the aquifer.
“It’s a money issue for most people,” Orberg said.
As he talked, Orberg’s children carried split wood for their stove, the only way the family heats the mobile home.
“We don’t know what’s going to happen,” Jacob Orberg, 16, said.
Some can afford a well
Ray Lee had a contractor dig a well 488 feet deep at his place on Rimrock Road about several weeks ago. That cost him more than $30,000.
He had no choice but to dig the well, said Lee, 82.
“I can’t sell a place if I don’t have water,” he said.
Lee went to all the community meetings, where residents and government officials unsuccessfully discussed how to keep the Rimrock Water System alive.
Snohomish County PUD said it could take over the system, which would cost residents $1.7 million or about $30,700 per household.
If no one wants the system, the state can require Snohomish County to assume responsibility for it. But the county, which doesn’t own or operate any water systems, doesn’t want it, county officials said.
“Politicians don’t seem to want to do anything,” Lee said.
Residents have thought about forming a new water association, which would cost about $1 million, or roughly $20,000 per household, said Sara Schurr, an area resident who has led the community’s effort to try and solve the situation.
But Lee said he would be against forming the association because he didn’t want to throw his good money away on what he believes is a bad system. He decided instead to dig his own well.
“I’m too old for that kind of stuff,” he said.
System is set to fail
The water system’s station remains largely ignored in the woods south of Monroe, where moss has collected on the aged system’s roof and grown around cracks on the walls. Rusted pipes leak constantly.
Since September 2003, the state Department of Health has told the residents to boil their water because of possible contamination.
The system often lacks water pressure to keep contaminants from flowing back into treated water. And surface water, which runs on the ground and collects pollutants, may be polluting the system’s water source, said Derek Pell, an assistant regional manager of the Northwest office of drinking water for the health department.
The system’s current owner, Gamble Bay Water Inc., of Kitsap County, took it over after the previous owner went bankrupt last November. Gamble Bay told the state it will abandon the system in March.
Meanwhile, Rimrock resident Schurr, 53, said she’s past frustration and has given up on the idea that the residents can form a water association.
She recently had contractors drill 320 feet down to get a well. Including the hookup, the total cost will be around $25,000, she said.
That the community didn’t come together to find a solution didn’t surprise Schurr. After all, neighbors don’t know each other well.
“We can’t see any of our neighbors except for nights when their lights are on,” she said.
Reporter Yoshiaki Nohara: 425-339-3029 or ynohara@heraldnet.com.
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