If they don't find it a corporation can't be held liable and the taxpayer picks up the tab for shoddy services again, Bay Stater.
"MWRA finds piece of coupling that caused water main break" by Brian MacQuarrie, Globe Staff | June 18, 2010
After more than a month of futile searching, a small piece of the failed coupling that caused the water main break on May 1 has been discovered in Weston. The piece, an 11-by-12-inch sealing plate, was found Wednesday during grading work between the Charles River and the mammoth pipe that supplies water to much of Greater Boston....
The search, which has cost $137,000, has been suspended until next week, when the MWRA plans to bore into an excavation pit next to the pipe. Potential hot spots have been identified there, where the soft, sandy soil has made digging difficult and posed possible saying dangers for the pipe....
--more--"
With work suspended was it really necessary to run a second piece?
"Clue to water main break elusive after seven weeks" by Brian MacQuarrie, Globe Staff | June 20, 2010
WESTON — The detective work continues. So far, no good.
With the spending meter at $137,000 and counting, state officials still have not found a 1,200-pound, 31-foot steel coupling that could show why 2 million people in Greater Boston suddenly lost their drinking water May 1.
In the layman’s mind, the search might seem like finding an elephant in a haystack. But to the engineers, excavators, and executives who continue to comb the site where the coupling burst on the region’s main water line, the stubborn reality has become a long-running, frustrating mystery.
“It’s a little bit embarrassing,’’ said Frederick A. Laskey, executive director of the Massachusetts Water Resources Authority....
The search has yielded a few tantalizing nuggets of evidence: a small sealing plate, an O-ring, and a single bolt that possibly comes from the collar. But the coupling itself, two pieces of metal that had joined a pair of massive steel pipes for seven years, remains elusively at large....
Get out your checkbook, Mass. taxpayers.
Finding the coupling is considered critical to determining why the water main burst, who is responsible for the failure, and whether other parts of the water-delivery system are vulnerable. The bolt, for example, is believed to have been rusted when it broke, Laskey said....
After ONLY SEVEN YEARS the thing is ALREADY FALLING APART?
WHO RIPPED YOU OFF, Massachusetts?
First the Big Pit and now this hunk of contracted crap.
Related: Memory Hole: Massachusetts' State Budget
Yeah, they have more important interests to spend your tax loot on, Bay-Stater.
Look where the POT of GOLD is GOING!
"MWRA approves lowest rate increase in 15 years" by Brian MacQuarrie, Globe Staff | July 1, 2010
Influenced by the enormous strain on municipal budgets, the Massachusetts Water Resources Authority approved yesterday an average increase of 1.49 percent in water and sewer assessments for fiscal 2011, the lowest hike in 15 years.
The new assessments for the 60 communities served by the MWRA were set after a plea last year from the MWRA Advisory Board to hold the line this fiscal year, which begins today....
Yeah, the government did you good by holding the line, sigh.
Despite the move to keep spending in check, budget calculations could still be thrown askew by a jump in utility prices or an increase in variable-rate debt interest, which would add expenses, said Ria Convery, the MWRA spokeswoman.
Which means INTEREST PAYMENTS to BANKS!
In the end, she said, the authority opted for rate relief instead of a financial cushion through a combination of no personnel growth, no raises for management or union staff, and the use of surplus money for debt payments.
They STILL have the NERVE to say it is RELIEF when the RATES are STILL GOING UP?
And DON'T WORRY, the DEBT GUYS will get their TAX LOOT!!
They are FIRST in LINE!
In other business, the MWRA board heard that workers still have not found the failed coupling from the catastrophic water main break in Weston on May 1....
I'm getting that old sinking feeling that it will never be found.
New excavation, which Laskey estimated will cost $60,000, is scheduled to begin early next week....
On top of the hundreds of thousands already spent for a seven-year old pipe that was supposed to last arrrrrrrrrrgggghhh!!!!
The break, which resulted in a boil-water order for Boston and 29 other communities, has prompted the MWRA to accelerate its rehabilitation of a secondary aqueduct from Marlborough to Weston. The board approved adding $1.4 million in extra labor costs, on top of an existing $47.6 million contract, to complete the project by March 2014, instead of September 2014.
WTF?
But they don't have enough to keep libraries open and social services are (allegedly, if you believe the paper) are being slashed.
In a related response to the failure, the MWRA announced that an independent panel has been filled to investigate the break....
Uh-oh!
Now it HAS all the HALLMARKS of a COVER-UP!
They are never finding that piece -- if they have not already and are just hiding it and well, like so many things in the paper now, it's a mystery.
