Southwest Water Company
Triangle Wastewater Treatment Plant
Gulfport, MIssissippi
In a textbook public-private partnership, a government
entity and a commercial company work together
for the equal benefit of both. The municipal
agency gains an experienced and efficient staff. The
private company earns revenue, reputation and reward.
Gulfport, Mississippi, has joined many other cities
of its size (about 72,000 people in 63 square miles)
in turning to an experienced private company for the
expertise to operate certain of its departments. The
approach allows the port city to stretch tax dollars by
taking advantage of private-sector efficiencies and management
methods, with no compromises in service.
Since 1999, Southwest Water Company subsidiary
Operations Technologies, Inc. (OT/SWWC), has supplied
Gulfport with a matched set of virtually worry-free turnkey
services: Water & Sewer, Streets & Drainage, Customer Service &
Billing and Special Projects. The company operates and maintains
the city-owned water production and treatment facilities, regional
wastewater treatment plant and regional water distribution lines,
wastewater collection lines and lift stations. It also administers all
quality assurance and regulatory compliance programs, ensuring
that the systems operate in accordance with federal, state and local
health and safety standards.
In a representative 12 months, the Southwest Water subsidiary
installs 7,275 feet of culvert, cleans 310 miles of ditches, picks up
37,800 cubic yards of trash, installs 1,775 tons of asphalt and trims
6,200 miles of grass. It reinforces 200 sewer line cave-ins, repairs
500 water leaks, clears 1,384 backups, locates 475 pipeline fissures
with special video cameras and smoke generators (smoke and mirrors),
installs 700 new water and sewer meters, and conducts 7,110 “line locates” (flagging pipeline locations before digging starts at a
construction site). By using the public-private partnership model
instead of operating water services itself, Gulfport realizes a formidable
annual cost savings of $500,000.
But facts, numbers and job routines went down the drain one
day in August, 2005, the day Katrina came to town.
Partners, Come Hell or High Water
On August 28, the company had to toss out the partnership playbook
entirely. That day, Hurricane Katrina began steamrolling
through cities on the gulf coast, leaving a swath of ruin not seen
in the South since the Civil War. The storm pancaked the water
and wastewater facilities of public partners Gulfport, Long
Beach, Biloxi and Pascagoula. Fearing the worst, Southwest
Water Company staffs in Los Angeles and Houston tried in vain
to reach anyone in Gulfport by land line, cell phone or e-mail.
Meanwhile, OT/SWWC’s corporate siblings around the country
(ECO Resources, Novus Utilities, Aqua Services) loaded up
trucks with water facility experts and relief supplies and convoyed
to Mississippi. The goal: restore service to the company’s public sector
clients.
Within one day after the trailing edge of the storm passed
through, a cadre of company workers had “boots on the ground”
even before official first responders. In fact, OT/SWWC’s clearing
of debris enabled emergency and rescue agencies to get into
and navigate around city. To their great relief, crew members
found that none of their coworkers had been lost or injured.
Most had still made it in to work, though many could not get to
their own homes and belongings. Some had lost everything.
In Gulfport, the omnivorous hurricane had crippled 144
sewage pump stations. Workers at one wastewater plant barely escaped
a 30-foot tidal surge by clinging to handrails and climbing
to the roof. Every day, company employees reported finding bodies
in the deep water covering what had been streets, not to mention
snakes, rodents and panicked pets. Before long, our crews
had to wear tee shirts emblazoned with “Emergency Response
Team.” In addition to giving many their first clean shirts in days
and creating camaraderie among relief agencies, the shirts helped
armed townspeople distinguish helpers from looters (lawn signs
warned, “You loot, we shoot”).
OT/SWWC quickly returned 130 of Gulfport’s affected
pump stations to service, got all of its water wells and disinfection
systems back on line, and repressurized the water distribution system.
In other words, the residents’ fresh water and wastewater
were back to going where they were supposed to.
In addition, the company helped the city provide basic human
aid and comfort to untold thousands of the stricken city’s
inhabitants. President Bush, in a public ceremony, applauded
what he called the “heroic acts” of meter reading supervisor Jerry
Darden. He and two neighbors rescued more than 20 Gulfport
residents trapped in their houses by fast-moving floodwaters.
They swam, clung to trees and at one point, tied themselves together.
Their efforts were profiled in the Mississippi Sun Herald.
Employees of a private-sector company had literally risked
their lives for their public partner, some working
48 hours
straight, to restore the most essential service of all, getting fresh
water to residents in dire need. It is no surprise that public and
private partner renewed their contract in September 2006 for
$6.6 million per year, their second such renewal since 1999. |
