By DAVID TELLER
Staff Reporter
Four Lakes residents got a shock on July 1 when they received a notice from the Four Lakes Water District No. 10 board of commissioners informing them an emergency drought situation had been declared. Residents were asked that they stop all outside water use, which included lawns, gardens and orchards.
The notice was issued because water levels in the area have dropped dangerously low with the recent warm temperatures. Water district commission member Scott Rushing said the problem is compounded by the fact that water levels on the community's well, which is on Craig Road, have not recovered despite record level snow fall last winter, which the water district was hoping would happen.
“We've been watching water levels regularly decline for five years,” Rushing said.
In mid-July 2007 normal water levels in the well were 169 feet over the pump, which is 69 percent of the well's depth. Draw down is the drop in water level in the well during peak use. At the time, the draw down level decreased to 98 feet of water above the top of the pump in the 245-foot deep well.
On July of this year, those same levels were 93 feet of water and 28 feet of water over the top of the well, respectively.
“It's just not down there to pump,” Rushing said with a shrug. Earlier this summer, he said the draw down was as low as nine feet over the top of the well.
Under the current production, Washington State Department of Ecology senior hydro-geologist Guy Gregory said the water district could exhaust its resources soon.
“They are in danger of not being able to serve water to their district by the end of the summer,” he said. Gregory agrees that the lack of recharge from the last winter has been detrimental to water supply.
Since then, the water commission enacted a plan to relieve the situation by restarting a well that is located on the Seventh-Day Adventist Church property in Four Lakes. Rushing said the well has been shut down for about two years, mainly because of nitrate levels.
Rushing said the nitrate levels are a result of influences like farming and the use of fertilizers, but added that there are others influences too. He said the current level of nitrates in the well is 9.3 milliliters per liter. Ten is the maximum legal level.
Now that the unused well is active, Rushing said the water is fed into the 300,000-plus gallon storage tank on Four Lakes Hill. He added that mixing the water from the two wells would dilute nitrate levels further. He said the nitrate levels should not affect water district customers, but suggests residents should use extra filtration on their drinking water.
The diminished water supply has the water commission puzzled, but Rushing suggests that the heavy number of housing developments in the area is a contributor.
Getting more production out of the well is not an easy solution. Rushing said sinking the well deeper is not practical because of geology. To explain, Rushing offers an analogy.
He said imagine a glass of water filled with rocks and gravel. Now slip some straws into the glass. Some of them will go all the way to the bottom, some will stop on top of a rock. The well on Craig Road is one of those straws sitting on a rock, and Rushing said he is doubtful the layer of rock under the well could be penetrated.
How long the added well is going to help, Rushing said he doesn't know. He said it could recharge instantly or at a trickle. For now, the water district has lifted the ban on outside watering, but they are still asking people to cut back.
“We should all be conserving water,” Rushing said.
David Teller can be reached at [email protected]
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