Staggering number of Jackson water valves found shut off

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The man in charge of fixing Jackson's troubled water system said there are a lot of changes on the way.

Ted Henifin, the third-party administrator over JXN Water, said improvements are being made with the first batches of federal dollars approved and starting to be spent. He has been taxed with fixing the freshwater system and seems poised to take over the fixing of wastewater, too.

"We just recently saw the first part of that. We applied for $115 million in grant money. That grant has been awarded, is in, and I have drawn down $15 million already," Henifin said.

The federally appointed administrator for fixing Jackson's water system said the federal dollars are starting to flow on a host of water repair projects.

Speaking Monday before the Stennis Capitol Press Forum, Henifin said there are clearly a litany of water flow problems. In the first six months, they have discovered a staggering number of water valves that were actually shut off.

"We are right around 60 major valves that have been opened as a result of their efforts," Henifin said. "That is why we can stand here and say the pressure in the system is more reliable than in many years."

But the pressure is building for Henifin to take control of the city's wastewater dilemma, too, with a federal judge ordering the city and state to negotiate a consent decree that could give Henifin oversight in fixing the massive amounts of raw sewage that Jackson releases into the Pearl River and nearby waterways regularly.

Henifin said he is already looking at ways that federal dollars could be steered to those sorts of repairs.

"There is potential that $100 million, plus $25 million, could be used for sewer, as opposed to water," Henifin said.

Despite state legislative efforts to restrict a change to how water billing is handled, Henifin said he could start a plan based on property square footage later this year.

"Ultimately, the new rate structure, if we can get that all worked out sometime late this year, and would apply to everybody, we would start collecting at that point with consequences for not paying," Henifin said.

Henifin was guarded about that billing structure plan but admitted there are still an estimated 7,000 properties getting water in Jackson but not getting a bill. He said the city is losing about 30 million gallons of water each day because of the leaks and problems that are still undiscovered in the city system.