Just before the 4th of July holiday weekend the water tower on the New Richmond Schools campus on Bethel New Richmond Road was drained and taken out of service for contracted maintenance that occurs every 10 years. The tower provides water to the hill neighborhoods with consistent pressure via gravity. When the tower is out of service water pressure is dependent largely on pumps designed to fill that tower. Beginning July 2nd, the first of three major water main breaks occurred due to pressure surges from those pumps. This morning an electronic control system was installed on those pumps aimed to control the speed of the pumps to regulate the pressure and/or shut those pumps down to prevent excessive pressure and pressure surges. Earlier today, Saturday July 11, the pumps shut down twice. There were no main breaks today. The water outages today occurred initially due to calibration issues with the new equipment. The most recent this evening was not a calibration issue but caused by a power surge during the storm that again caused the pumps to shut down.
New Richmond has the oldest water system in Clermont County. Much has been learned this week about the deficiencies inherent to old infrastructure. The Village sincerely apologizes for the inconvenience caused by these recent occurrences especially to customers in our hillside neighborhoods. We appreciate the patience and understanding expressed by many of our customers.
