Murky water despite new pipes, St Lucy folk say

Residents in parts of St Lucy said on Monday they were yet to see meaningful improvements in water quality, despite pipe-laying works and repeated assurances from officials that relief was coming.

Their complaints follow a recent announcement by Prime Minister Mia Mottley that government planned to build a second desalination plant for the north and complete filtration works by August, to finally address the long-running brown-water issue affecting households in St Lucy and St Peter.

But for some residents, the promised improvements still feel far away.

One woman who has lived in St Lucy for 31 years told Barbados TODAY she believed conditions were improving during the general election campaign more than three months ago.

“Around elections the water was clearing up,” she said. “I asked my husband if the new pipes were put down but I don’t know…. For me it has been ten years of having water like this.”

Reverend John Carter of Connell Town said that while work had been visible in some districts, residents were still dealing with discoloured water.

“Well, the truth is that… new pipes have been in St Lucy, but not in the area I live. I live in Connell Town. No pipes have been, no new pipes have been there in Connell Town.”

Reverend Carter said he had travelled through several areas where work was reportedly completed, including Crab Hill and Pie Corner, but had not heard residents report improvements: “I have friends who live in that area [and] not one has said to me that the water is any better. To my knowledge, nobody has said that the water quality has improved.”

He added that the continued presence of water tankers in communities suggested the underlying problems remained unresolved. “The thing that shows that the water quality has not improved is that the tankers are still coming out weekly to give people water.”

Reverend Carter also questioned the quality of road repairs after sections were dug up to accommodate the new mains.

“In the Crab Hill area, they still resurfacing that stretch,” he said. “That resurfacing is not complete and secondly, I don’t know that it’s at the level or the quality that they would expect.”

Checker Hall resident Ralbert Ashton said that while he had noticed “a little improvement” in the water, the roadworks themselves created daily challenges for him.

“Even though I know that there is a need for the work to be done, I think that they have a little bit more insight to be added to, for a person like myself that has to traverse back and forth to the bus stop,” said Ashto, who is visually impaired. “And then they don’t have any person to direct you to the roads.”

The eight-year resident said he relies on a walker to reach public transport and often struggles navigating unfinished sections of road.

“It’s extremely difficult when you have a lot of roads cut and they’re not filled in a timely manner, so you’re stumbling a lot,” he said. “Nobody’s there to really direct you.”

Despite those frustrations, Ashton maintained the work was necessary. “You can’t delay the work, it has to be done in a timely manner.”

Speaking during President Jeffrey Bostic’s visit to St Lucy Primary School on Monday, MP for St Lucy Peter Phillips acknowledged that residents were still experiencing discoloured water, but stressed the project was only partially complete.

“The colour of the water… it is not completely as it should be as yet, because it’s a three-part process,” Phillips said.

“Changing of the mains is one aspect of it. You have to also do some work filtration project, which is at Alleynedale, that is ongoing right now.”

He said residents had been asking for clearer communication from the Barbados Water Authority about timelines and progress.

“Residents, they do not fully understand what it is. I’ve asked the Water Authority to basically share with them, and to explain, and to give us a timeline,” he said.

Phillips added that while frustrations remained, people also recognised the scale of the investment being made in the parish.

“It’s millions of dollars that you spend in one particular location, one particular parish,” he said. “I am certainly appreciative of the efforts that the Barbados Water Authority and the government are making to fix the longstanding problem in St Lucy.”

(LE)