What do the LA fires and Muskogee have in common?

What do Muskogee and the fires in Southern California have in common? It's not heavily grown underbrush. It's not over regulated environmental policies that waste precious water. It's lack of proper management of our infrastructure. Just like City officials of Los Angeles.

I'm told we have 100 to 120 year-old water pipes made out of clay. They've already collapsed in the historical district causing massive fecal matter back up in basements putting at least two people in the hospital with ecoli. Once again the city put a band aid on the problem despite public outcry about the issue needing to be resolved city wide. In other words they fixed the broken spots but have ignored the miles and miles of remaining 100 year-old water pipes.

The City has a history of ignoring problems until it becomes a crisis. Take the water plant for example. The City did practically nothing to keep the water plant running efficiently and to Oklahoma Department of Environmental Quality/EPA standards. Finally, the state ordered the City to build a new $80-$88M water treatment plant. That's why your water bill rates have been increasing.

Let's take the previous attempt by the city to pass a $77M bond for a new police department and $4.5M rehab of city hall. Obviously there has been no attempt to set aside maintenance/rehab money or even money for a "down payment" on a new police station. It seems to me that City officials like to improve Muskogee above ground while the real future devastation is below the surface. It's easy to point to new buildings and boast about how it makes Muskogee look so nice. But City officials are ignoring the white elephant in the room. With one sweep of its proverbial trunk it can take down a large part of the City because we'd rather point to "bling bling" than actually be concerned about our citizen's safety and the safety of their homes and businesses by starting a program to replace these ancient water lines.

Another example is the re-paving of hundreds of miles of City roads. We appreciate the thought, the planning, the effort but as soon as the new pavement came into existence you could see City worker digging it up to repair broken water lines. Does this make sense to you?

During my 30-year career with the military and federal government I was fortunate enough to be involved in crisis management where you plan for the worst and hope for the best. What is the city's plan if Muskogee has a major fire requiring massive amount of water to be pushed through 100 year-old clay water pipes? Can those pipes stand the pressure? What's the chance of some of them collapsing, thus blocking the flow of water to vital hydrants? Do we have a back up plan? In the military there is always a redundancy of equipment in case of failure of primary equipment.

With ancient water pipes the question is not "if" they will collapse during a major emergency but "when" and then the question is — what will Muskogee look like after that happens?