Okmulgee County Issues Mandatory Pump Shutdown In Effort To Fix Water Crisis

This week’s rolling power outages have led to a water crisis for Okmulgee County residents. The county issued a mandatory shutdown of all pumps today in an effort to search for leaks and potential water production problems. 

Rusty Roberts told News On 6 he has half a million dollars’ worth of livestock on the line and his horses and cattle are his livelihood.   

“No one thinks you're going to be four days without water in 2021,” Roberts said.  

Roberts said the animals need 15 gallons of water a day, but right now they are only getting a third of that by melting snow. He told us it is a slow process because 10 inches of snow only makes one inch of water. Meanwhile, he is using a chainsaw to cut holes in the ice on ponds for his cattle.  

"Is it time to move this livestock somewhere that we can get water, or do we need to find resources to somehow to start tanking water in to us,” Roberts said.  

Okmulgee County Rural Water District 2 said pump stations were without power for far longer than planned during Tuesday’s mandated power outage. They were unable to fill the water towers leading to low water pressure and outages. The City of Okmulgee is the main supplier to at least eight other districts and its supply simply cannot meet the demand right now.  

"We don't care whose fault it is,” said Roberts. “We're tough and we're survivors, but we have to have some answers." 

District 2 officials do not have a set timeline, but said Okmulgee has a strategic plan in place and is working steadily to get everyone back online. Robert's neighbor Kurt Rose said it is a community effort and that is why he spent the morning delivering water to help.  

"We all have to come together and put our needs aside and help meet the needs of others,” Rose said.  

Muskogee Creek Nation is delivering fresh water for residents at Twin Hills, Mounds Fire, Okemah Community Hospital and Preston's school bus barn. Only, Roberts said his animals need more to survive.  

"If we don't do something in the next 24 hours, we're going to be in crisis mode with our livestock,” said Roberts. "It could be devastating for us to lose one, but if we lost our entire full crop or something like that it'd be beyond pandemic devastating." 

The district has issued a voluntary, precautionary boil advisory for once the water comes back online.