BATON ROUGE, La. (BRPROUD) – The Governor’s Office of Homeland Security and Emergency Preparedness said a state of emergency for the Town of Killian’s water issue is not needed.
An emergency declaration was issued Tuesday, April 23 after a water system failure in the town. A boil advisory has been in place since.
Livingston Parish President Randy Delatte said on Thursday, May 9 that the results from the Louisiana Department of Health showed bacteria was found in the sample taken from the Killian well.
“However, LDH Engineering Services later learned that the test was performed before the well was disinfected and while the well’s sanitary seal was still open,” GOSHEP officials said in a news release. “The positive result was likely due to these factors.”
According to GOSHEP, LDH conducted multiple samples of the distribution system and found the water was negative for total coliforms.
LDH has instructed the Killian Water System to fix the well as designed. They must also clean it, close it using a sanitary seal and disinfect it as the state’s sanitary code requires, the news release said.
Once that is done, LDH will take more samples from the well and the distribution system. If the samples test negative for coliform, the Killian Water System will be told to lift the boil water advisory, GOSHEP officials said.
“A state emergency declaration is not needed as part of this process and is not recommended by GOHSEP. Unfortunately, there are multiple water systems around the state at any given time with similar issues as Killian that do not require this step. GOHSEP will continue to provide support to help Killian and the parish get through this crisis,” said GOHSEP Director Jacques Thibodeaux.
GOHSEP is working to send a second shipment of bottled water to ensure residents have drinking water while the issues are fixed.