A Crossville City Council special called meeting today focused on the current water supply situation. Water department  Director Joe Kerley was asked by Councilman Mark Fox if indeed the City water department was in ‘dire straits’ as some officials have been purporting lately.  Mr. Kerley replied the City is currently in compliance with State regulations implying not in ‘dire straits’ but added that in the future will need some upgrading and updating to keep up with the growing demand for water in Crossville.  There is a City voter referendum coming up on November 3rd that could grant the City Council permission to move ahead researching and possibly voting on a proposed transfer of the City water and sewer assets to a newly formed independent water utility called Cumberland Plateau Water Authority.  The basis of those promoting the transfer is that the City Water Department overall is in serious need of upgrading in the future at a phenomenal expense to the taxpayers if not transfered to CPWA.

During the livestream of the Council meeting today CNF received questions from some city residents asking why the water filtration system hasn’t been monitored and upgraded over the past several years allowing it to get to this point of near failure.  Another citizen wrote: “Everyone says we may run dry of water with only two lakes serving the water department because we are “on a rock”.  What about the other large lakes in the county besides Meadow Park Lake and Lake Holiday. There are at least five other large lakes in excess of 100 acres each in the county that the City could potentially pull water from.”

CNF did investigate and learned that the City of Crossville can bolster its water resources using Lake Tansi if needed but preferably only a few months in the winter when the lake is not being heavily used by residents otherwise the City has to pay a fee for water from Lake Tansi if used during the fair-weather months. To our knowledge, the City of Crossville hasn’t had the need for water from Lake Tansi to date.

We will submit any and all questions to the City for answers.