The water bill will come due, eventually

Not long ago, Weirton’s water system – and the people it serves – went through one of the worst winters in its history, with hundreds of line breaks and numerous water outages over a period of several weeks.

People weren’t happy, and, eventually, the complaints found their way to the West Virginia Public Service Commission which held a public hearing in Weirton and launched its own studies of the system.

Among its findings, the PSC ruled Weirton’s storage tank capacity is not sufficient enough to meet requirements of the city, that approximately 40 percent of the water lines are not located below the frost line, and inadequecies in the way customers of notified of issues within the system.

The PSC ordered a detailed plan on the replacement of cast iron and galvized pipe, a leak detectio