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About Omaha daily bee. (Omaha [Neb.]) 187?-1922 | View Entire Issue (April 29, 1909)
' J.'. ' 4 1.1 h. 'I N't'..';'-', 1 TIIE BEE: OMAHA, THURSDAY, APRIL 29, 1009. To the Citizens'-of Omaha: Although public attacks on the Omaha Water Company with regard to the quality of water it furnishes have already been met with an action for libel a' public answer 6eems needed in order to reassure the community as well as in justice to the company. While every spring, as everyone knows, the water of the Mis souri River becomes especially turbid and the removalof discolor ation becomes difficult, 'no harm to the health of consumers has ever been known to result. The charges to the contrary are not only rau.icious and unfounded, but they have far more effect than damage to the water company, for they inevitably damage the city. It may please newspapers, for political ends, to spread re porta that the water supplied to Omaha is impure, but they should at least make sure of their facts, instead of publishing false state ments one day which they have to disclaim the next. The facts are, as shown by honest investigation, that the water now supplied by lhe. Omaha Water. Company is not, and never has been, detrimental to the health" of those who use it. In 1905, in the annual. report of the Omaha Board of Health, for the year 1904, Dr. Ralph, Commissioner of. Health, said: "I believe it goes without saying that the water in use is bet ter than in the majority of other cities. This fact has been proven ', so many times both by chemical and bacteriological analysis that it cannot be doubted. ' I have had an analysis of the t;ity water made at four different ' times ; in the past year. In January, February, June and December. The water, being taken from the intake at the river, the settling basin and from faucets; in the central part ' of the city? In each cape, in the language of the bacteriological- ist, "It 'is pure and ;wholesome and compares favorably with water anywhere in the 'country, and is incapable of causing dis aae.V . This much' cannot be said of the average wells of Omaha, and when it is possible I condemn them, having condemned fifteen wells in the past year. Four of the latter were furnishing water for four of the largest office buildings of the city, claiming econ omy as the reason.'.' The water that the company now furnishes is the 6ame i fur-, nished in 1904 and the same that it has all along been furnishing. At times there is discoloration and it must necessarily be so, and even if that could be prevented, it would be at a cost for the en largement of the plant, which the company is under no duty to make and could not b expected to, as the city on the first of July will owe the company about $550,000 for hydrant rentals, includ ing interest, and it is unnecessary to say to any person of intelli gence that with this large sum of money owing to the company it is not in a position to make any expensive improvements.. The ; .water bqar4?in l906 might have accepted the offer made them by the board of , directors and allowed another main to be laid from Florence io the city, instead of ignoring the offer altogether, but preferred, for its own purposes, to-let the matter drift, to the injury of the city. In March, 1909, in accordance with my instructions to Mr. Fairfield, to' have the water analysed by the very best experts in the country, samples of the water taken from the intake at Flor ence and Burt street and from the basins were sent to Professor Smith, of the Beloit Sanitary Laboratory, who is understood to be an unsurpassed specialist in this kind of work, and I publish here with his conclusions and analysis: Beloit Sanitary Laboratory, Beloit, Wis., March 00, 1909. E. M. Fairfield, Gen. Mgr. Omaha Water Company, Omaha, Neb. Dear Sir: . I am in receipt of yours of the 26th inst. and by express yes terday the two samples of water which I have today completed the analysis of; The details of the examinations you will find on the sheet hereto attached which I used instead of the separate sheets, so you could easily see the differences. The samples as received were opaque from the suspended matters, so that after some study of them I concluded to make two separate analysis, one to show the actual condition of the water as received and the other the quality after thorough removal of all sediment. In order to do this, each sample was filtered through a heavy quadruple paper which was washed as clean as possible. The filtration was slow as the sediment was so fine that it other- -I .1 . , .-.(I f - vise would have run through the papers. The results are ccr ininly interesting though they make Free Ammonia in the filtered water a little higher than in the other; this is, however, a matter of laboratory error, as I have always found it almost impossible to wash out all traces of Ammonia in the filter papers used and the traces left make themselves evident when we have to use a thick paper as in this case. This is the only contradiction in the results as otherwise you will find them clear and very much to the inter pretation of your waters. x Some conclusions may be suggested to you: 1. The sediment suspended in the water is an even 100 niil igrams for each liter of water, or 5.8 grains per gallon. 2. One sample is almost the exact duplicate of the other. 3. The Ammonias are not high; the Free Ammonia in each sample is low for any water, and the albuminoid Ammonia is within reasonable limits. 4. The comparison of the filtered and unfiltered samples show that the sediment has. very little organic matter in it, but is mostly of a sandy character. 5. What organic matter is present is dissolved and not sus pended, as the clear filtered samples show so small a reduction in the albuminoid Ammonia and the oxygen consumption. 6. The ratio of the oxygen consumed is so high as compared with the albuminoid ammonia that evidently the organic matter is washed from the soil for the most part of rootlets and similar extractive materials. 7. The color of the water is but 10 on Hazen's Scale, and is not evident except in deep layers. , r Except for the extreme cloudiness of the water from the excess of silt I should not condemn this water on these samples; the data are certainly within the limits set for a water of good quality. . Signed, E. G. SMITH. . ANALYSIS Laboratory No. Samplei Color Turbidity Odor Sediment 10963 f No.l. (Burt St.) Yellowish Heavy Faint Heavy 10964 Same. Filtered. 10 Clear None None 10965 No. 2 (Florence) Yellowish Heavy Faint . Heavy 10966 Same Filtered 10 Clear None None PARTS PER MILLION Volatile Residue 164 172 134 . , 168 Fixed Residue 366 266 376 .272 Total Residue 530 438 510 440 Chlorine 575 575 575 575 Free Ammonia .052 .092 .052 407 Albuminoid Ammonia 412 8 .145 X)75 Nitrogen as Nitrates .1 4 42 44 Oxygen consumed after 10 minutes 8.5 7 JO 8.6 7 A Alkalinity 120' 120 120 120 Samples were taken at time of great turbidity; more recent analyses by Dr. Crowley show considerably less albuminoid am monia. On behalf of the water company I now make this proposition: That water taken from the intake pipes and from the reservoirs, in conjunction with a committee of citizens to be selected either by the Real Estate Exchange or the Commercial Club, be sent to some noted chemist to be agreed upon, for his analysis. If there is anything detrimental in the water furnished by the Omaha Water Company, the directors wish to know it; but they look upon the attacks at the present time as most outrageous bits of demagoguery. That the water supplied is not detrimental to the health, they have every evidence, both in analysis supplied by Professor Smith and the actual health of the people of Omaha. I trust that this letter is sufficiently explicit, and while I presume that this charge of dirty water would be allowed to die out after May 4th, I do not propose to allow it to do so until it is proven to the satisfaction of every decent citizen that the water company is not supplying a quality of water dangerous to health. THEODORE C. WOODBURY, President. " New York, April 26, 1909. J'JgJi'l'JM.l . !.. I. i r. i W w
