From Staff Reports

The Independent Review Committee on Water Outage presented its report to Asheville City Council at the latter’s scheduled June 13 meeting, according to a June 13 news release from the City of Asheville.

“The IRC was seated to review the water outage experienced by some City of Asheville water customers in late December 2022 and early January 2023,” the release noted.

Immediately prior to the council meeting, City Manager Debra Campbell was quoted as saying in the release as follows:

“We thank the IRC members for their diligent work and volunteer service to this effort.  

“The city staff and Council are always looking for opportunities to enhance our service to the community.

“As part of our own internal review of this incident, we have taken steps to address issues identified in the report with the following new positions requested in this year’s budget that include:

• “Crew to support distribution system maintenance and repairs

• “Staffing to enhance night coverage at water treatment plants

• “Staff to improve critical communication and customer engagement

• “Customer service staff to support meter project transition

 â€œCity staff is also in the process of updating our Emergency Operations Plan and Continuity of Operations Plan.

“We look forward to learning more as city staff and council members are able to review and discuss the report in greater detail.”

The full report and presentation are available to the public via the City of Asheville website on the Water Department homepage.

Moreover, a full recording of the June 13 council meeting may be found on the City of Asheville youtube channel.