KENTWOOD, La. — Another city in Tangipahoa Parish has been without water during the recent problems. Kentwood is known for its water and now, the whole town is out of it.
“It’s okay to go without water for a day or two possibly, but until Monday? That’s hard,” Kentwood resident Nikki Taylor said.
Unlike other towns in the parish, water outages during the winter are unusual in Kentwood.
“This is not common. This is something we experience during a hurricane, not because of cold weather,” Taylor said.
Residents aren’t the only ones impacted. After using bottled water all afternoon on Wednesday, the owner of Bec’s Chicken got creative. He brought a 550 gallon water tank to run the restaurant.
“We want to be here for the community, but at the same time, it’s very tiresome,” Bec’s Chicken Manager Jacquelyn Thomas said.
The city’s mayor says this shouldn’t have happened. The town’s well is brand new and large enough to accommodate the whole community. When the temperatures dropped below freezing, a valve malfunctioned.
“It’s definitely the cold weather,” Kentwood Mayor Irma Gordon said. “We have never had this problem before.”
She says they hope to have the water up and running by Sunday or Monday. In the meantime, Kentwood Springs is filling the gap, passing out cases of water to the community.
► Get breaking news from your neighborhood delivered directly to you by downloading the new FREE WWL-TV News app now in the IOS App Store or Google Play.