Grid Troubles Spark State Of Emergency
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The Water Valley Electric Department responded to a outage Friday morning on Duncan Street after a power line pulled loose from a splice, causing a small fire. The repairs took most of the afternoon.
WATER VALLEY – The Water Valley Board of Aldermen declared a local state of emergency due to ongoing problems with the city’s electric grid that could be perilous to the safety of people and property. The declaration came during a special city meeting Monday night following two electric outages within a two-week span.
Board Attorney Daniel Martin and Mayor Tommy Reynolds explained the declaration could help speed up repairs for future outages.
“Our local power company doesn’t have the manpower or resources to work outages while the power is live and we are having to cut off power to a large portion of downtown which is impacting our commercial center. It is affecting people’s livelihoods, our city’s commerce and public safety,” Martin noted.
The declaration will allow the city to fast-track the state’s bid laws, expediting contracts for an outside company to assist the electric department in future outages.
“We will inform the local agencies around us, if they have supplies that we can’t get to, they will be able to fast-track those supplies.
There is a lot of benefits to the declaration,” the attorney added.
The most recent power outage occurred last Friday morning, Nov. 15, after a primary electric line located near the rear wall of Mid Town Auto Parts on Duncan Street disconnected from a sleeve used for a line splice, similar to an earlier outage on Nov. 4. The downed line started a series of problems that impacted the transformer and ultimately caused a service line to catch fire. The noise from the arcing lines immediately attracted scrutiny from people in the vicinity and Alderman Ron Hart noted that the rapid response by the Water Valley Fire Department kept the entire block of buildings from burning.
The Water Valley Fire Department was dispatched to Duncan Street Friday morning to extinguish a power line that was on fire.
“If it had happened at 2 a.m., we would not be having this discussion right now because there would be nothing left,” Fire Chief Mark McGavock noted during Monday’s meeting.
“That is a fact,” Hart agreed.
The power was cut to a portion of the city including the row of buildings on the west side of Main Street in the commercial business district and residences around 11 a.m. and was restored before 5 p.m. after repairs were made. One of the charged lines fell to the ground, striking a vehicle and the heat caused over $4,000 in damage.
The earlier outage on Nov. 4 occurred during the replacement of two utility poles on Wagner Street. The plan during the replacement was to keep the lines energized, but a sleeve used for a prior line spice disconnected. The energized line fell to the ground, hitting a vehicle and striking a worker who escaped injury.
Martin initially explained that the purpose of Monday night’s meeting was to determine if there is an ongoing emergency in the city.
“A local emergency means a duly proclaimed existence of conditions of disaster of extreme peril to the safety of persons and property,” Martin added.
Responding to Martin, Water Valley Electric Department Business Manager Crystal Floyd reported that additional outages are possible.
Martin also noted that transparency in the process is essential.
“We like transparency, everybody in town likes transparency. We try to be upfront with everybody with what is going on. That is part of what we are doing here tonight, is to have this conversation. If the power goes down, our local guys cannot deal with it,” Martin explained.
Mayor Tommy Reynolds cautioned that the declaration is only one step in a lengthy process to make repairs to the city grid.
“This is not a guarantee that there will not be more outages, but we are pulling everybody together doing everything that is humanly possible to do,” Reynolds noted in the special meeting.
In an earlier city board meeting in November, aldermen approved a request by Electric Department Superintendent Brandon Richardson to advertise for proposals from outside companies to provide assistance for emergency repairs or maintenance work on the city’s power grid.
Reynolds reported that the bids will not be opened until mid December, but with the local declaration of emergency the city could move faster if needed.
The mayor also reported about efforts in recent years to secure outside funding to assist the department with improvements on the grids with $4,585,000 pledged from state and federal sources for the effort.
“We’ve got resources that are committed to this. I have been working on this for a while,” Reynolds reported, a reference to his previous role as a state representative prior to serving as mayor. “It is going to take years to get it like it needs to be. We need to anticipate the rough spots,” he added in Monday’s meeting.
Reynolds also provided an update on a project to install backup transformers that will provide temporary power for the entire city if the main transformer in the city’s substation fails.
“We have a projected shipping date of January 10 for the emergency backup transformers,” Reynolds said.
The city received a $367,524 grant to help fund the backup transformers, a project that started following a city-wide power outage in 2022 after the city’s main transformer went down. The backup transformers will connect to power lines coming from Tallahatchie Valley Electric Power Association’s (TVEPA) substation located in the industrial park. If there is a major outage at the city’s substation, the power can be switched over to TVEPA until repairs are made.
