County: Unclear when HOVE well will be repaired

There’s no estimated repair date for the county’s Hawaiian Ocean View Estates well, which has been out of service the past few days.

That’s according to Kawika Uyehara, deputy director of the Department of Water Supply.

“At this time, we’re still investigating the cause. Once we figure that out, we can figure out how to repair it,” Uyehara said Tuesday.

Meanwhile, the drinking water spigot station remains open to the public for potable uses only, but the county asks residents to take only what they need. The standpipe facility is closed to water haulers.

According to Uyehara, HOVE doesn’t have residential county water service, and the spigot is the only source of county water for residents of the remote Ka‘u subdivision.

“It’s not a distribution network out there for us. It’s just a spigot that services the community out there,” Uyehara said. “We don’t have a customer count for that.”

Uyehara said the county is using a commercial water-hauling service to bring water in for residents who use the community spigots. He said he doesn’t know how much water is being hauled in or the cost, at this point.

The standpipe at the spigot site currently is closed to commercial water haulers, the county said in a statement.

“That’s because of the volume,” Uyehara said. “We don’t want to use up the water that’s being hauled in. Still, we want to provide the basic water service to the community.”

According to the county, DWS is contracting emergency work to troubleshoot and repair the well as quickly as possible.

For additional information, call (808) 961-8790 or email dws@hawaiidws.org.

Email John Burnett at jburnett@hawaiitribune-herald.com.