OKMULGEE COUNTY, Okla. — Rural resident Mike Wegley said his family has weathered plenty of hot summers near the town of Preston. But the last few have been the toughest, with persisting water shortages from Okmulgee County Rural Water District 2, AKA Preston Water.
"It's outages every so often. I mean you don't know until you get home sometimes that water's out," Wegley said. "So it's just kind of a headache at times."
This shortage affects close to a hundred households.
District Manager for Preston Water Valerie Rice said residents can come to an inlet and water buffalo at the district office on Polk Avenue and get some drinking water if accessible, until crews can get the overall pressure back up.
"We have to have water to work with to find what's going on in the system, so unfortunately that's what we have to do to try to get some water in our tower," Rice said, in reference to water pressure consistently staying below 25 PSI.
Rice, who added her own house is without water too, said there's no single entity to blame for the issues.
She explains that a combination of past weather events damaging equipment was made worse by a surge of demand since Memorial Day.
Not to mention, the district's small crew also rushed to fix a busted feeder line.
"It's turning into just operating the system under crisis management because everything's hitting us back to back to back until we get the new feed or get the pressure that we need from (City of) Okmulgee, or get this temporary upgrade to the pump station, are we going to get back to where we can handle things," Rice said.
The City of Okmulgee didn't respond to numerous calls for comment about water fed from its supply, or its assistance to the rural supply.
Rice estimates another three days minimum until houses could have usable water pressure again, and hopes $1.2 million of ARPA grant money will soon result in new equipment installments.
Preston water posted Wednesday that affected residents can get free showers at Tulsa RV Ranch ten minutes north of Preston off US-75.
"We have a lot of tenants that use these (showers)," Tulsa RV Ranch manager Weston Criqui said. "And so now with this coming up we've been more than happy to open our doors to the other people that need it."
Wegley, who said his house hasn't had water service since Memorial Day weekend, just wishes he didn't have to depend on the generosity of others to simply support his family and their dogs.
"You can't water your animals if you have pets," Wegley said. "You can't shower unless you go to somebody else's house to shower when you shouldn't have to when you have your own at your place, but you don't have any water."
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