Selectboard hears about leak, pump control failure; approves pursuit of grants and rewiring work

Brian Hays, a Town staff member, reported that a significant water leak was located and shut off at the curb, allowing well pumps to return to normal operation for about a week. He said pumps later failed to operate in automatic mode, and Laviolette Controls was contacted to run pumps manually to keep reservoir levels sufficient for fire protection. An overpressure event then caused an excessive feed of caustic chemicals; crews flushed hydrants and provided repair and leak-assessment records to the New Hampshire Department of Environmental Services (NHDES), which accepted the documentation and advised no additional reporting was required barring further failures.

Hays told the Board that the pressure-center control board had malfunctioned and that cycling power produced only temporary relief; manual operation of the pumps remained unavailable at the time of the meeting. Laviolette Controls is scheduled to rewire the system by bypassing the outdated pressure-center controls and integrating pump operations into the existing programmable logic controller (PLC). The Board also discussed replacement of the school’s two-inch digital water meter (internal battery failing), planned August maintenance including replacement of a lift-pump suction line at the mill house, and pursuing a newly available grant/loan program to upgrade wells, pumps, controls, VFDs, ventilation/dehumidification, and to replace the aging Onan generator from the 1990s.