Behind-the-Scenes of a Water Crisis

To name all of the players involved in managing the 42-inch GLWA water transmission break on May 10^th would be an impossible task with the number of characters permitted on this blog, but I wanted to highlight a few individuals who were key to the success of managing the water main break and resulting State of Emergency. The entire City of Auburn Hills came together, from the community and businesses, as well as city employees who all played a critical role in managing the emergency.

The Auburn Hills Fire Department led by Chief Trevin Robinson and Police Department headed by Chief Ryan Gagnon provided unwavering support in key areas such as water distribution, traffic control and being first responders at the moment the water main broke. The entire Department of Public Works (DPW) was involved in helping to manage the crisis, with every person in the department playing a critical role. When the water transmission line broke at 1:35 AM on the morning of Sunday May 9^th, Roads Crew Leader Jason Beckman immediately organized staff to respond to the break and began mobilizing crews. Throughout the week, the administrative office staff including Kelly Justman, Maria Meli and Betty Meli, answered hundreds of phone calls to supply pertinent information regarding boil water advisories, areas affected and proper procedural responses for both businesses and residents. Lisa Passalacqua, our Community Engagement Manager, was consistently active updating social media posts and our website to relay critical information as it occurred to keep the residents and business community informed. The City Manager’s Office, led by Tom Tanghe, was instrumental in organizing communications and strategies to keep the community informed to pertinent developments. It truly was a collaborative team effort to help manage the crisis.

Our member partners including Pontiac (Zach Earp), Orion Township (Bill Basigkow, Supervisor Chris Barnett), Rochester Hills and GLWA (Sue Coffey, Pete Fromm, Anthony Troy) came together to devise an audacious plan to try and keep the communities in service through rerouting water and filling the water towers in Auburn Hills and Orion Township. Once the plan was established, their execution was flawless and prevented a much greater hardship for the surrounding communities. The teams held dozens of operations, public information and emergency management meetings to work through the crisis.

Above all though, I want to highlight the tremendous effort of one group in particular who rose to the challenge and displayed the very best of what public service is to a community. The DPW Public Utilities Department, led by Jason Deman, were tasked with an incredible workload of rerouting water, continuously monitoring the water system to ensure proper flows and pressures and juggling a complex process for getting water to both Orion Township and Auburn Hills water towers. Unfortunately, this could not be done simultaneously and the system needed to be constantly tweaked to supply enough water to Orion and Auburn Hills water towers to help avert a deeper crisis. The team, under Deman’s leadership, exuded calm in the face of chaos and displayed an intense persistence to make the audacious plan succeed.

Mr. Deman’s technical understanding of the system and strong leadership helped steer his team to a successful outcome, working countless hours managing the system and monitoring its performance. In addition, Mr. Deman used this technical knowledge to help maximize the performance of the water system while simultaneously working with GLWA to manage the repairs of the broken transmission line. Tom Innes, the Crew Leader for the Water Department consistently led operations in the field while Matt Kelley was instrumental in spearheading field operations which included turning dozens of valves and bypasses in a precise sequence to minimize risk and maximize the performance of the system. Former Utilities Crew Leader Rob Cox was a critical resource for specific details and expectations about system performance and detailed knowledge about water infrastructure. The public utilities staff responded with 92 straight hours of service and was able to maintain acceptable pressure in the water system while keeping enough water in both towers to prevent Orion Township and the northern part of Auburn Hills from running out of water.

The event that occurred was unfortunate and disruptive to so many, but the way the community came together and the staff from the City of Auburn Hills and our neighboring communities rose to the challenge is something I will always be proud of. It is somewhat fitting that the long week of managing the crisis happened during National Public Works Week and our team exemplified every bit of their slogan “Rooted in Service, Powered by Community”!

Stephen Baldante, Department of Public Works Director