Frustration boils after water goes out in KC neighborhood

By Greg Payne

Click here for updates on this story

    KANSAS CITY, Missouri (KCTV) — People living in a Kansas City neighborhood off Gregory Boulevard say they were left without running water for about 18 hours.

For Josh Lehne, knowing whether his water will run is sort of a guessing game.

“We’ve actually had this big Ozarka bottle left over from many of the other outages, from the summertime,” Lehne said. “Then, my wife brought home extra water to make sure we always have some on storage downstairs.”

Yesterday afternoon, those came in handy as many people living in Lehne’s neighborhood were without water until late Tuesday morning.

“My wife had to go to work without a shower,” said Brad Moore, who lives on Gregory Boulevard. “We had to brush our teeth with a water bottle. When the water goes out, it’s kind of a big deal.”

For months, Gregory Boulevard has been filled with crews working to replace a water main. The city said the cause of Monday’s outage, however, was a water main break on West 70th and State Line Road. They said that is unrelated to the nearby water replacement project, which is on Gregory Boulevard and east of Ward Parkway.

While neighbors understand that water main breaks are unpredictable, they said there have been many times where their water issues happened because of the ongoing water main replacement project. So, in the future, they just want to be in the loop when it does happen.

“Can we get a consistent block of ‘this is the time when the work is going to happen’ and be done, so we can plan for it? Just finding out just by turning on your water is not really acceptable,” Lehne said.

The city said they regret any service lapses that may have happened on Monday.

They went on to say that the pipes in the area are up to 100 years old, and that the water main replacement project is scheduled to be completed in mid-January of 2023.

KCTV5′s Greg Payne spoke with John Murphy of the Armour Fields Homes Association, which oversees the area. He said that, for the duration of the project, the city has to do better.

“Communication, feedback, and proper management. They need to communicate directly with the residents what is going on, get the feedback of the residents,” Murphy said. “When they take on a project of this size, somebody needs to manage it.”

The city said you can sign up for alerts on the project by clicking here.

Please note: This content carries a strict local market embargo. If you share the same market as the contributor of this article, you may not use it on any platform.