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| Photo Credit: AP. |
JACKSON, Miss. (AP) — Water pressure slowly improved in Mississippi’s capital city Friday but officials outlined numerous challenges and occasional setbacks as they worked to restore running water from the city’s aging, neglected water system to all in the city of 150,000.
A minor leak
in an ammonia tank forced officials to cordon off a part of a water treatment
plant late Thursday, Jim Craig, a state health official said Friday. Staffers
at the plant are having to constantly account for changes in sediment and
chemical levels in water taken into the system after recent torrential rains
and flooding, Craig added.
“It’s like
fixing the airplane while you’re still flying,” Craig said at a Friday evening
news conference with Gov. Tate Reeves.
Mayor Chokwe
Antar Lumumba noted at one news conference that, once pressure is restored,
there are worries about the strain on aging, brittle pipes.
And even
when water is running again, it’s unclear when it will be drinkable.
Last week’s
rains, followed by flooding of the Pearl River, exacerbated long-standing
problems at the O.B. Curtis treatment plant, leading to a drop in pressure
throughout Jackson, where residents were already under a month-old boil-water
order due to poor water quality.
The problems
led to a Monday emergency declaration by the Republican governor and a disaster
declaration from President Joe Biden. Biden’s infrastructure coordinator, Mitch
Landrieu, and Federal Emergency Management Agency administrator Deanne Criswell
were in Jackson for a firsthand look at the problem Friday.
“This is a
true testament to President Biden’s commitment,” Criswell said at an evening
news conference with Reeves and other state officials. She toured the main
water treatment plant earlier in the day with Reeves.
“Many are
now experiencing normal pressure. Areas further from the plant and at higher
elevations may still be experiencing low to no pressure,” the city said Friday
morning.
But, among
the setbacks: pressure dropped a bit at one point as treatment plant staffers
had to deal with chemical imbalances in the water, Craig said Friday evening.
It’s all a
continuing strain on residents, like 64-year-old Mary Gaines, a resident at a
complex for senior citizens and people with disabilities.
“It’s a very
nice place to live. We just ain’t got no water,” Gaines said. “And most senior
citizens ain’t got no car, so we have to get water wherever we can.”
At his news
conference Friday, the Republican governor repeatedly stressed what he called a
unified state, federal and local response to the crisis, discounting any
suggestion of a rift with the mayor or president, both Democrats.
He thanked
Criswell and Landrieu for the help and noted that Biden had “quickly signed” a
disaster declaration. Lumumba had not been invited to a Reeves news conference
Monday as the crisis was unfolding and he was not at the Friday news
conference. But he appeared with Reeves earlier in the day during a water plant
tour and was part of a Thursday news conference.
Reeves
didn’t address and hasn’t commented on remarks Biden made to reporters at the
White House late Thursday.
“We’ve
offered every single thing available to Mississippi. The governor has to act,”
Biden told reporters. “There’s money to deal with this problem. We’ve given
them EPA. We’ve given them everything there is to offer.”
White House
press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre declined to elaborate on Biden’s remarks
Friday. She confirmed that Biden and Reeves haven’t spoken to each other about
the crisis, but downplayed the lack of a call, saying it was “not necessary to
further any progress in this situation.”
Statewide,
there is about $75 million specifically for water resources available through a
bipartisan infrastructure law signed by Biden last year, Jean-Pierre said.
Biden was
asked Friday whether he would visit Mississippi and said he had no plans to.
Biden said he has been talking to people in Mississippi including Lumumba.
Residents in
Jackson have long struggled with a faulty water system before the latest
crisis.
The National
Guard has been called to help with water distribution. The state emergency
agency said close to 2.8 million bottles of water were handed out from midday
Thursday to Friday afternoon. Non-potable water, for toilet flushing and other
uses, was also being offered to people who brought their own containers to some
sites.
The entire
city had been without water or with low pressure at one point. Figures on how
many homes and businesses had service restore were not available.
McGill
reported from New Orleans. Associated Press writers Michael Goldberg in
Jackson, Rebecca Santana in New Orleans and Seung Min Kim in Washington
contributed to this report.