That was quite the storm last week. In speaking to people, very few were able to sleep through it. Mother Nature can put on an amazing show when she wants to. I was surprised and thankful that the storm didn’t cause any major fires in the state.
The storm’s lightening did cause a couple of fires locally. There was one on Jenkin’s Creek. I’m told that when the Rural Fire Dept. arrived the rain had already put it out. There was another one east of Midvale that the Midvale Fire Department was able to control.
Here in the City, it appears that the storm caused a primary underground electrical line, that provided power to several downtown businesses located around Washington Square, to fail. The line had been buried directly in the ground decades ago without any sheathing, leaving it unprotected. The power surges from the storm apparently became too much for the line and it failed, leaving The Golden Horse, Elemental Wellness, RC Pawn, The Artful Bon, Glarborg Accounting, Casey Girl, and Pepper’s to be without power.
The various departments jumped right on it. Mike Campbell, the Public Works Manager, coordinated the effort. First, all of the underground services for water, waste water, telephone, optics, etc. had to be located to avoid cutting lines. Once this was completed, the Electrical Department, consisting of Wayne Wallace, Devin Rider, Jason George, and Enoch Ward began digging to uncover the line. The Waste Water Dept. sent a couple of guys, Jarret Wright and Robert Hilliard, with the vacuum truck to help uncover the other delicate infrastructure lines that would easily be cut with a backhoe or shovel. When the line was uncovered, it was found that the line had been spliced before so it was already in a weakened condition. The old line was then taken out and replaced with new line in a conduit to protect it. If there is ever a failure with this line in the future, it will be a simple matter of removing it from the conduit and threading a new line in. They worked hard all day on this. Power was restored to the businesses before 6:00 that evening.
Fortunately, there is very little directly buried primary line left in Weiser. There is still secondary direct buried line running to individual residences in town. However, in the event any of these lesser lines fail, the City has equipment to provide temporary power to the house in the event of power line failure until the line can be replaced.
It is situations like this that continually make me realize how fortunate I am, as mayor, to have inherited a finely tuned organization that knows their stuff, works together as a team, and does their jobs without a lot of fuss to provide for the people of Weiser. They do these types of things day in and day out without a lot of recognition, but with a lot of pride. Thank You to Mayor Thomas, prior Mayors, and David Tate for creating this team that I inherited and have the privilege to work with.
In other business this week, just a reminder that the city has a new RV dump up and running on the corner of W. Idaho and W. 9th where the recycling center used to be. It is designed to accommodate traffic from either street and can handle two units at a time.
Also, just a reminder that school is in session. Please watch for kids walking and riding bikes going to and from school. Our children have enough issues to deal with this year without having to worry about inattentive drivers. So please do your part.
If you haven’t had a chance, or even if you have, check out the Farmer’s Market at the Train Depot every Thursday evening from 5:00 to 7:00. It’s well worth it. There are a number of vendors with a wide variety of produce and products for sale.
Well that’s it for now. Hope you have a great week in our great community!
You must be logged in to post a comment.