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View of the Bay HOA asks city staff to explore fixes after multi-day water outages
Summary
Homeowners association leaders described a multi-day water outage after an ice storm and asked Depot Bay staff to meet with the HOA to explore targeted short-term solutions such as storage tanks or backup generation for the neighborhood pump station; council directed staff to confer and report back.
Jim Tittle, president of the Blue Bay Homeowners Association, told the Depot Bay City Council the View of the Bay neighborhood relies on a pump house the developer installed and the city adopted; when power is lost, the pump house loses water pressure and the entire neighborhood can lose service. "We had 4 and a half days with no water," Tittle said, describing an ice-storm outage that posed particular hardship for older residents.
Tittle said the neighborhood has about 38 homes served by the pump station and that the city has maintained the pump house since accepting it from the developer. He said the city replaced the pump station last year at a cost of about $150,000. Tittle asked that the city allow HOA members to work with the appropriate city representative to explore a narrowly targeted solution for short-term outages; he said his goal was not to propose a final plan but to begin technical discussions with city staff.
City staff explained several possible technical approaches, including installing a storage tank at elevation to provide gravity feed, installing a generator, or exploring longer-term options such as a fuel cell. Staff cautioned that each option carries trade-offs — storage tanks can require pressure-reducing equipment and generators require fuel logistics during extended outages.
Councilors asked staff to confer with the HOA. City staff, including Brady, agreed to meet with HOA representatives and bring options back to the council for consideration. The council indicated consensus for staff to coordinate the discussions and report results in a future council meeting.
Why it matters: A localized water-supply failure that lasts multiple days can create public-health risks for vulnerable residents and complicate firefighting capacity. The HOA requested targeted technical analysis and a staff-led pathway to consider feasible short-term resilience measures without replacing the entire system.
Next steps: City staff to meet with HOA representatives (contact: Jim Tittle) and report back to council with possible solutions and cost estimates.
