More than three weeks into a boil water advisory over brown, silty water, leaders of the Livingston Parish town of Killian are facing the threat of daily fines from Louisiana regulators and furious residents chewing them out in public meetings.
Town and parish leaders have said they don't have enough money to fix the problems with the water system, which serves about 1,000 people. Last week, they said they needed state emergency help, citing a bacterial sample they said pointed to the need for $730,000 worth of repairs and at least two weeks of trucking in water.
But on Tuesday, the Louisiana Department of Health said the town can fix the problem much more quickly and simply — though town officials say they can't afford that either.
If the water isn't made safe to drink soon, the state could fine the town up to $333 a day, the agency said.
Hours after the state issued its ultimatum, a crowd of residents packed a town council meeting, with some chewing out Mayor Ronnie Sharp.
One resident who aimed expletive-laden shouts at Sharp and the Board of Aldermen was escorted out after a stare-down with Police Chief Steven Fontenot, who was armed.
To see video of residents confronting the mayor, click here. Warning: Contains repeated use of vulgar language.
Alderwoman Kimberly Gill said Sharp had left the board in the dark for months about the scope of the problem, which prevented members from potentially spending money to fix the problems. Residents said Sharp was not responding to questions and records requests and that he and the aldermen were not doing enough to keep residents informed.
"I've been disappointed in the way you've handled this water thing. Now, not providing records, not ... you not addressing the public when we, when the people elected you as mayor and you have all these other people out here in front of you," Vickie Parrish, 72, a Killian resident, told Sharp.
Sharp did not respond to a request for comment.
Just how bad are Killian's water problems?
Residents say they are upset that they can't get answers to basic questions: Just how badly messed up is the town's water system? And when will the boil water advisory be lifted?
One resident asked whether it was safe for visiting family members with compromised immune systems to drink the water now. Sharp would only respond on Tuesday that the boil water advisory remains in place.
Killian resident Jamie Smith, 40, stands to ask town officials a question Tuesday, May 14, 2024, during a Board of Aldermen meeting. During the heated meeting, she and other residents had questions about the management of the town water system and what they asserted was a lack of information from their elected leaders about the town's response.
Town and parish leaders have said the damage is too severe for them to fix and urged Gov. Jeff Landry to declare a state-level emergency and free up state funding — including potentially $4 million for an entirely new well.
But state health officials say such an emergency is unnecessary and inappropriate. They have said repeatedly that samples of the water system have not tested positive for dangerous amounts of bacteria.
They have also repeatedly noted that the brown water and silt the town is seeing is common for systems with iron and manganese in their groundwater and federal regulators don't generally consider them public health risks.
State officials said several tests had come back clean and they were about to lift the boil water advisory when town officials decided to open the well to look for structural damage on May 1.
Konnor Kosa checks inside the hatch of a large tank carrying potable water at Killian’s water well near Town Hall on May 1, 2024.
Engineers who conducted the well inspection for the town say no structural damage was found, but Livingston Parish leaders announced that a test of the well water more than a week after the inspection found a potential indicator of harmful bacteria.
State officials say that positive test was likely because the well had been opened up for the inspection and later the use of a temporary pump, not any fundamental problem with the well.
"The test was performed before the well was disinfected and while the well’s sanitary seal was still open," the officials said in a statement. "The positive result was likely due to these factors,"
On Tuesday, Secretary of Health Ralph Abraham and Interim State Health Officer Pete Croughan ordered the town to stop using a temporary pump that is keeping the well open to the air and potential contamination. They want the sanitary seal on the well restored, and the pre-existing or an equivalent pump put back on the well by Friday.
They also want the system disinfected and prepared for a new round of tests that the state — not the town — will conduct.
“Ensuring the Town of Killian has safe, clean drinking water is a top priority for the Louisiana Department of Health, as is lifting the boil water advisory in a timely fashion,” Croughan said.
How serious was the crisis?
Now that state officials say regular water service could be restored with less extensive fixes than local leaders had called for, some residents are questioning whether the whole emergency was necessary at all.
At Tuesday's meeting, Josh Gill, the husband of one of the town alderman, pressed the mayor to lay out details on the original bacterial sample that he alleges first caused the town to issue a boil water advisory.
Sharp said that was an "unofficial sample" and disputed it was the reason for the boil water advisory anyway. Instead, he said it was the brown water, rocks and silt appearing in the system that might indicate the well was damaged.
Killian Mayor Ronnie Sharp reviews paperwork on Tuesday, May 14, 2024, before the start of what would be a heated town Board of Aldermen meeting. Residents became angry after Sharp didn't want to discuss troubles with the town water system, which he is running after the town recently did not rehire its management consultant.
Gill countered that brown water and silt have been a chronic problem in Killian, not a new emergency.
After the meeting, Gill accused town officials of inflating the seriousness of the problem as a "money grab" to get the state to pay for fixes to longstanding maintenance problems.
Critics say Sharp — who ran the the water system as a town employee for years — bears responsibility for the current predicament. He is running the system again after the Board of Aldermen recently dropped a consulting firm that had been assisting him.
"Part of the problem, I think, is that you're feeling a little defensive because you were the one that took care of the water for years and years and years and didn't do all the maintenance that was required," said Parrish, the Killian resident. "So, I understand you're not wanting to talk to people because the problem lays at your feet, sir. So, all I'm asking, I want some transparency."
Later, it came to light that Sharp, other officials and a public notary had signed an agreement for Livingston Parish to cover water response costs upfront and for the town to pledge future grant dollars as reimbursement, without approval from the board of aldermen first.
The town's attorney had specifically directed that the pledge of future grant dollars to be removed, the lawyer said, because reimbursement was unlikely to be allowed by most grants.
The signed agreement presented Tuesday night to the aldermen for an after-the-fact approval ending up having the language the attorney didn't want. The vote was tabled.
Killian Police Chief Steven Fontenot stands over Louis McKinney, 45, left, after Mayor Ronnie Sharp had ordered him to leave a town meeting. McKinney and other residents wanted to talk about recent troubles with the town water system. Sharp initially resisted doing so. Fontenot was armed; McKinney eventually left with Fontenot's escort but not before cursing out Sharp and the aldermen.
In an earlier special Killian meeting on April 29, Bruiser Bryson, Livingston Parish's homeland security logistics deputy, said the system was super-chlorinated after a positive bacterial sample sometime around April 23 to protect the public. But he said that decision had harmed chances for the declaration.
"Well, in our own way to try to control it, we killed the damn bacteria that would help us get the emergency declaration," he said.
At the time, Bryson was airing concerns that Killian's old distribution lines could burst when the system was repressurized after the well inspection. The line damage didn't happen.