March 12, 2009
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Small Expenditure Nets Big Savings For City Taxpayers
DECATUR - A $26,000 expenditure authorized by the Decatur City Council last year for a water system survey is expected to save city taxpayers a minimum of $1.7 million over the next decade.
Last year council authorized ADS LLC to perform a leak detection survey of our entire water distribution over the next three years. The first 1/3 of the survey has been completed for the downtown and west end areas of the city which revealed a total of 34 leaks throughout the city that were losing 785,000 gallons of water per day.
Twenty nine of the 34 leaks have been repaired and 775,000 gallons of the total leakage recovered will result in savings of $172,554 each and every year. The retail value of the water no longer leaking is $231,958.
The largest single leak was found at Central Avenue near Warren Street which was estimated to have leaked 600,000 gallons of water per day. The cost for City staff to repair the leaks was $21,471.
“It is clear that this survey has saved the city and most importantly the community a substantial amount of money, important especially with the economic situation that we all are facing today,” said City Manager Ryan McCrady. “Add to that the fact that one of the Council’s top priorities has been the securing of additional water supply and it becomes clear that the authorization of the survey was a wise decision.”
For more information contact Keith Alexander, Director of Water Management, at 424-2863 or Billy Tyus at 424-2753.