County facilities staff outline multi‑million-dollar plumbing repairs, hire options and plans to bring cleaning in-house

Missoula County facilities staff told commissioners the county faces extensive, aging water piping failures across multiple county buildings — including the county detention center — and presented two main options to address the problem: a large annual capital set‑aside or hiring in‑house trades staff.

The facilities presenter said the piping system at the detention center was installed around 1999 and that the county has replaced roughly 1.5 to 2 miles of piping to date, which staff estimate is about 10% of what is needed. “We’re probably averaging on an average year, we’re averaging close to 500 hours of overtime just for water leaks at the detention center,” the presenter said. The presenter described examples including three‑inch supply lines that can discharge significant volumes when they fail and pinhole leaks that are often discovered only after multiple layers of ceiling materials have been breached.

To address the deterioration, staff offered two options: establish a large annual capital allocation of roughly $500,000 a year for the next 10 years (a program staff described as a roughly $5,000,000 scope) to develop scopes and…