Water Line Replacement Surprise

The Need:

As our school year was beginning we were contacted by the City of Steubenville to alert us that we had to get our water line replaced.

There were a few reasons for this:

1. our meter was the old style, and there was no valve to shut off the water before the meter to allow them to replace it;
2. the curb box was broken, so the City was incapable of shutting off the water in case of emergency;
3. they determined that our line is lead (don’t worry, no one ever drank the water; we have always brought in filtered water for drinking).

This meant a full replacement from the water main under the center of Maryland Avenue all the way back to the meter in our basement.

We protested that we were unable to absorb such an expense at such short notice, so the City of Steubenville graciously worked out a plan where the City contracted with the plumbing company for a very reasonable amount of $3,600, and will bill us in monthly installments in our regular utility bill over 18 months.

We agreed to this arrangement. The work was carried out on October 30.