I spent eight months in 2015-2016 living just a five-minute walk from the Cathy Jokerst Water Treatment Plant in Herculaneum.
Despite the proximity, my drinking water didn’t come from there. Instead, I was served by the city of Crystal City. More on that later.
My husband and I were building a new home and were offered Crystal City lodging by a friend while waiting for our project to be completed.
We packed as little as we could to get by and put the rest of our belongings into storage. Without my usual diversions, I found myself walking outdoors more often, and I strolled down to that humming water plant several times. There was time to ruminate about my lifelong relationship with Jefferson County water.
I grew up in Festus, and our city water was hard, hard, hard. My dad used to lie down beside our gas water heater and scrape out lime from its bottom periodically. Six kids used a lot of water and the more lime he scraped out, the better for our supply.
If you grew up in Jefferson County, you probably prefer your tap water with a little “flavor.” I know I do.
After my Festus years, I spent more than two decades in the Fenton area of Jefferson County, served by Public Water Supply District No. 3. I liked the taste of our “mineral” water just fine.
A Mexican exchange student, Evelyn, came to live with us for the 2004-2005 school year. She was used to an environment where drinking from the tap was a really poor choice, so we had to buy gallon jugs of water for her.
After months of seeing me drink from the faucet, Evelyn finally tried it – and survived! Soon, she found herself enjoying limestone-flavored H2O.
But years later, when we could afford a fancier refrigerator that provided a filtered water supply, I realized just how “limey” our water must be. You couldn’t procrastinate on changing out the water filter in the fridge and it was always HEAVY when discarded, chockful of the “extras” it had pulled out of the water.
Ensconced in Crystal City for our stop-gap move, water again became a topic of discussion. We washed our dishes in the sink and bought a dish drainer, something we hadn’t had in decades. After only a few days of letting water run off our dishes, I noticed something strange on the base of the drainer – a scaly orange residue. Hmmmm, what was this mineral we tap-drinkers were ingesting? I’d clean off the scale every other week or so only to have it return like clockwork.
The taste didn’t bother me, though. This Jefferson County girl is accustomed to water with some heft to it.
It soon became clear that many Crystal City residents were not fans of their water. Co-workers and neighbors told me so, and the subject – not the water – became crystal clear the day of the advisory boil order.
We learned of it at the newspaper and my husband scurried to tell a neighbor who is on a fixed income, lives a stringent life and struggles with bills.
“Phhhhh! I don’t drink that stuff,” he said and pointed to his supply of bottled water that he was somehow scraping up the money to pay for as an alternative to the tap.
Crystal City water had an image problem, but at least it was expensive – the most expensive public water in Jefferson County, the Leader confirmed for the story that runs on Page 1 today.
We’ve moved into our Festus house now and I again find that Festus water tastes like home. There’s no orange residue at the sink, although brown water was a problem at the Leader’s Festus office off and on in years past.
I’m told that Crystal City water has improved markedly since the city went online with a brand-new water plant last summer.
That’s good, I guess. But, as our study shows, water costs vary widely in Jefferson County and choices made by providers over the years have had an effect on customers’ pocketbooks.
Along with Crystal City, Festus and Herculaneum residents are paying the most. Festus and Herculaneum went online with the Cathy Jokerst Water Treatment Plant in 2003, built through a new entity, the Jefferson County Water Authority, which pulls its supply from the Mississippi River.
The towns wanted Crystal City and other water providers in the vicinity to join, cutting the cost for all.
Nope! We don’t need no stinkin’ cheaper water. Crystal City was not interested and remains that way, having now gone into debt for an $8.6 million water plant rather than join the authority.
Psssst…Crystal City residents, you are paying hundreds of dollars more a year for water as a result. Look at our chart and do the math.
Of course, it was Crystal City voters who said “No” to joining the Water Authority in April 2000. The late fire chief Tony Picarella led a campaign that urged them to vote No, and they did.
So Crystal City water users have made their own high-priced waterbed.
The Leader has done water rate studies twice before, in 2003 and 2009, and Crystal City’s water was the priciest in both of those years, too. In fact, today’s cartoon by Judy Dixon dates back to that first study in 2003.
Four county water districts in north Jefferson County buy water from Missouri American Water at a much lower cost than Festus, Crystal City and Herculaneum. These include No. 1 (serving the city of Arnold), C-1 and No. 10 (serving unincorporated Arnold, Barnhart and Imperial, and Kimmswick), and No. 3 (serving unincorporated Fenton and Arnold areas).
Leader reader Paul Wilcoxen of Herculaneum points to Missouri American Water and consolidation of services as a wise move for all. The company has been soliciting other Jefferson County agencies. Stay tuned.
Missouri American pulls its supply from the Meramec River.
I bet it would still taste like home to me.
