Houston Public Works behind on water leak fix schedule with oncoming winter weather

HOUSTON, Texas (KTRK) -- Houston Public Works is behind schedule for water leak fixes as we head into a weather pattern that could make them worse.

During winter weather events, a lot of attention is paid to power, but impacts on other public utilities, like water, are also significant.

"Crickets, nothing," Kenneth Rogers said while showing ABC13 a water leak near his home in River Oaks.

Rogers said he's heard nothing from the city since reporting a water leak in front of his home to 311 on Jan. 1.

"Here we are, three weeks, with thousands of gallons of water going down the drain," Rogers said.

In previous water leak reports this summer, the city has said that when the ground dries out and shifts, it can cause water leaks to form or worsen. The city said on Wednesday that the same can be true during prolonged freezes.

"We're getting ready to have very cold weather, which is a big concern because of the pipes, and the pipes are going to freeze," Rogers said.

The city said there are 521 leaks in Houston. Their goal is to fix 90% of leaks within a week, but in the last 30 days, they said they've only been fixing 57% of leaks within a week.

At city council Wednesday, there was no specific mention of water leaks, but wastewater and water treatment facilities were a topic of conversation with Public Works director Randy Macci.

"The three big service water plants are the ones that we really have our biggest focus on, as well as our repump stations that help move water across town," Macci said.

Public Works said they have backup power ready to keep drinking water facilities online if there are outages. Macci shared that wastewater facilities don't have permanent backup power, so they'll be relying on rotating generators in the event of power going down.

"We hope that is not the case, but if it is, the result of that will be sanitary sewer overflows that we've seen in the past," Macci said.

Macci asked residents to not drip faucets. In a city this big, he said that much dripping changes water pressure and negatively impacts the water system.

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