WAPA Says It Has Taken Corrective Action In Estate Diamond After Resident Sends Video Showing Brown, Contaminated Water

ST. CROIX — WAPA Director of Communications Jean Greaux told The Consortium Wednesday that the authority had take corrective action regarding what Mr. Greaux described as “discolored” water coming from the faucets of an Estate Diamond home on St. Croix.

The resident on Sunday provided the Consortium with a video showing brown, contaminated water flowing heavily from a faucet in their home, and said the issue had been ongoing for three days.

“We took corrective action there and wanted to reach out to the person,” Mr. Greaux said.

After the Consortium published the video Tuesday, a number of Virgin Islanders territory-wide said they’ve been experiencing the same problem.

“I also have this problem. We need help and fast,” said Luz Feliciano, a Christiansted resident on the Consortium’s Facebook platform.

“Reason I have to go to the laundry every week,” Ramona Menders said.

Senator Allison DeGazon also expressed concern. “I have many questions about this brown WAPA water. Unacceptable,” she wrote on her Facebook page.

In 2015, the problem was brought to the fore by Senator Kurt Vialet, who called on officials of the Department of Planning and Natural Resources to fine WAPA for what Mr. Vialet said at the time was an ongoing problem of WAPA customers being the victims of brown, contaminated water that flowed through their faucets.

At the time, Mr. Vialet also challenged the Department of Health to conduct surveys and collect pertinent data in relation to the potential effects of the contaminated water, and how it may have affected residents in neighborhoods and communities.

“WAPA’s water in certain parts of the island comes out brown and residents can’t use it,” Mr. Vialet told The Consortium in a brief phone interview in 2015, adding that WAPA was well aware of the problem, but had yet to solve it.

Mr. Vialet, a former principal at Arthur A. Richards Junior High School, said he had to install filters throughout the school’s water system in order to get clean water.

“The house owner or the person living in the housing community should not be responsible for making sure that WAPA’s systems transport clean water to their faucets,” he said.