Water main breaks cost City of Cape Girardeau thousands of dollars

Water main breaks have cost the City of Cape Girardeau thousands of dollars while suffering 46 breaks in 2024 as of Sunday, Dec. 15, according to an Alliance Water Resources document provided to the Southeast Missourian.

The 46 water main breaks include one of the most recent breaks Dec. 9 near the Cape Rock Water Treatment Plant, which led to a citywide boil-water advisory. That break cost the city $12,364, with $4,351 of that amount in water loss. An Alliance Water Resources employee who did not want their name used, told the Southeast Missourian that, depending on the water main size and how quickly it can be fixed, some may cost around $1,000 to fix while some could cost six to seven thousand dollars.

Alliance Water Resources local manager Jonathan Ridings said while there have been other larger main breaks this year, such as the one seen near the Cape Rock Water plant, the water loss may have been different compared to the others. He said minus the water loss expense, those costs incurred with other larger main breaks could be comparable with the one Dec. 9

Ridings said the Dec. 9 main break took around 200 man hours at time and a half to fix.

Alliance Water Resources excavation superintendent Lucas Cook said the pipe material may be one of the biggest indicators of how long a repair might take.

"If it's cast iron, 95% of the time, I would say it's a full circle break. We can dig down to that, put a clamp on it while the service is going as normal," Cook said. "When we get to a plastic water main that has broken, that is where it gets more time-consuming, because typically they split, and you cannot put clamps on them ... . Whenever they break, a chunk of the main will come apart, and those usually entail a lot more time on those."

The unnamed Alliance Water Resources employee also told the Southeast Missourian that the current server that pushes out boil advisories timestamp is "about 12 hours behind actual time". The employee said that when the boil advisory for the Dec. 9 main break was "pushed" out for the online maps said "12/9/24", but was then changed to "12/8".

The employee told the Missourian this has been an issue for several years.

At the Monday, Dec. 16, City Council meeting, Ward 4 Councilman David Cantrell said that while the city isn't in a crisis, the situation regarding the city's water is "serious". He said boil-water advisories not only have an effect on the residents but also the businesses, restaurants, hospitals and schools.

A measure to raise water rates to pay for water system improvements failed on the November ballot. Cantrell said the council should consider putting one on the April ballot. But Mayor Stacy Kinder said the Monday meeting was the last time a ballot initiative could be approved for the April ballot.

She said that since it wasn't on the agenda, they couldn't place it on the April ballot, but his point still stands. Cantrell called it "unfortunate" that the council ran out of time to place the measure on the ballot.