{"id":12961,"date":"2013-02-26T09:41:33","date_gmt":"2013-02-26T15:41:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/?p=12961"},"modified":"2013-02-26T09:45:04","modified_gmt":"2013-02-26T15:45:04","slug":"konawa-the-small-town-with-big-water-problems-gets-a-little-assistance","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/2013\/02\/26\/konawa-the-small-town-with-big-water-problems-gets-a-little-assistance\/","title":{"rendered":"Konawa, the Small Town With Big Water Problems, Gets a Little Assistance"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"attachment_12469\"  class=\"wp-caption module image right\" style=\"max-width: 300px;\"><a class=\"fancybox\" title=\"Justin Johnston, a wastewater treatment plant operator in Konawa, Okla., crouches next to a decades old sludge pump during a tour of the town's water systems in December. \" href=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/files\/2013\/01\/jason-johnston.jpg\" rel=\"\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-12469\" title=\"jason-johnston\" src=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/files\/2013\/01\/jason-johnston-300x199.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" height=\"199\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-media-credit\">Logan Layden \/ StateImpact Oklahoma<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-caption-text\">Justin Johnston, a wastewater treatment plant operator in Konawa, Okla., crouches next to a decades old sludge pump during a tour of the town&#39;s water systems in December.<\/p>\n<\/div><p>The city of Konawa will fix two wells and build new water lines with a state grant issued last week, the <em>Ada News<\/em> <a href=\"http:\/\/theadanews.com\/x273852544\/Oklahoma-Water-Resources-Board-gives-98K-to-Konawa\">reports<\/a>:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>The grant, from the state\u2019s Rural Economic Action Plan program, will be used to extend the well casing and build an elevated platform for the pumps and controls on two of the town\u2019s nine water wells, and to construct seven-tenths of a mile of water lines, blueprints show.<\/p><\/blockquote><p>The $98,435 grant will do little to fix the city&#8217;s ongoing water issues. The city of 1,300 faces millions in repairs to its aging water system, city manager\u00a0Rita LoPresto <a href=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/2012\/12\/27\/america-can-fix-its-crumbling-water-infrastructure-if-you-help-pay-for-it\/\">told StateImpact<\/a> in December.\u00a0Konawa\u2019s water system \u2014 like those of many small towns in Oklahoma \u2014 was built in the 1930s, when federal money for such projects surged. Much of the south central Oklahoma city&#8217;s water infrastructure is still from that era.<!--more--><\/p><p>If the federal government revokes the State of Oklahoma\u2019s authority to regulate drinking water \u2014 which could happen if the state Legislature doesn\u2019t <a href=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/2013\/01\/10\/oklahoma-needs-2-million-to-prevent-an-epa-takeover-of-its-drinking-water\/\">appropriate $1.5 million<\/a> to help cover the costs of complying with <a href=\"http:\/\/water.epa.gov\/lawsregs\/rulesregs\/sdwa\/mdbp\/index.cfm\">three EPA rules<\/a> \u2014 Konawa could face $15,000 per day fines for water pressure problems, LoPresto told StateImpact.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The city of Konawa will fix two wells and build new water lines with a state grant issued last week, the Ada News reports: The grant, from the state\u2019s Rural Economic Action Plan program, will be used to extend the well casing and build an elevated platform for the pumps and controls on two of [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":36,"featured_media":12469,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[491],"tags":[499,495,427],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12961"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/36"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12961"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12961\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/12469"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12961"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12961"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12961"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}