Back – in “civilian clothes”

Hello, people – it’s been five years since I posted anything here but I’ve decided that, even though I’m not holding office anymore, I can use this site to provide share views and solicit the opinions of others.

We’ll mainly talk about Kingston and Ulster County affairs and sometimes talk about things important to the state and the nation. But we don’t have to restrict our discussion to these areas. As far as I’m concerned, the sky’s the limit, so LET’S HAVE AT IT.

So, why the title? I was inspired a few months back when I used Facebook to complain about discolored water coming from my kitchen tap. The Kington Water Department failed to notify the residents that there was a pretty good reason why our water was brown. They were removing a water hydrant.  What they didn’t tell us ahead of time, they later posted on Facebook in response to my complaint. Cutting and pasting their response below:

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Kingston Water Department

February 3 · Kingston ·

Rusty Water on Moore St. Following a posting on a resident’s personal FB page, we have been alerted to a rusty water complaint from a resident of Moore St. Here is a summary of the events in question:

On Tuesday, February 2nd, the KWD removed a hydrant, originally installed in 1911, on the end of Moore near Cross St. The valve that was associated with the hydrant was leaking and, since there was a new hydrant within feet of the old one, the hydrant and the valve were removed. This was a planned repair and we could have and should have notified the residents of Moore St. We apologize for the lapse. 
Previously, on Friday, January 22nd, KWD responded to an emergency on Moore St which turned out to be a leaking service. We shut down the leak, provided temporary water to the impacted property and they had the service lateral repaired on Monday, January 25th by a private contractor. In response to such an emergency, it is impossible to provide advance notice of our work. The call about water coming up in the street was received at 2:30PM and our staff was on scene until the work was completed at about 7PM that evening. Following our work on both the 22nd and the 2nd, our personnel flushed the hydrants to clear the main of rust, an unfortunate byproduct of these repairs. Despite our best efforts to clear the rust from the system, rusty water is sometimes drawn into private residences. In those cases, it is necessary to flush the plumbing within the home. The KWD has a 24/7 emergency response number: 331-0205. At all times it is answered by an employee of the Water Department. If we had been called by the resident last night, we would have dispatched an employee to assist in resolving the issue. It is impossible for us to monitor the Department’s Facebook page 24/7 and when things are posted on private pages we can’t even respond to the individual. Face Book was never intended to be a place where people report emergencies of any kind. Please, if you experience a problem with your water supply or need to report a water emergency, please call our emergency number at 331-0205 and you will receive prompt assistance. Thank you.

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What I “enjoy” most about this message is the defensive nature of it. At any rate, at least the department apologized for the “lapse,” in failing to notify residents that they’d be showering in  brown water thanks to a project they were doing.