RIVIERIA BEACH, Fla. — The Palm Beach Office of Inspector General said it will release its report on the city's response to a water contamination event next week.
Water treatment plant Superintendent Melvin Pinkney resigned earlier this week. City officials didn't say if his resignation was voluntary or if he was terminated.
Riviera Beach Mayor Ronnie Felder asked the office for an investigation in February, after the city waited about seven months to notify the public about fecal bacteria and E.coli being present in the city's drinking water supply.
Originally, city staff said Riviera Beach's Special Utility District's water treatment plant removed the contaminants. However, emails WPTV received show the city didn't notify the public because it believed the positive water sample tests were "false positives" after the city failed to perform correct testing procedures.
Riviera Beach
Mayor: E. coli, fecal matter contaminated Riviera Beach drinking water
The city did its investigation over the incident, but council members weren't aware of the investigation. Officials have waited nine months for the investigation, which should contain a response from the city, who was aware of the problem, and when they were aware of it.
A health department investigation found utility broke Florida law 13 times after discovering coliform and fecal bacteria from treated water supplied to customers. The utility, which is governed by Riviera Beach and serves customers both in the city and in some surrounding areas, paid a fine worth $80,842.60.
LOW BLAMED HEALTH DEPARTMENT FOR THE PROBLEMS
Ultimately, the fine led to the board firing Utility Director Michael Low, and to the resignation of Assistant Utility Director Stephen Doyle. Low blamed the health department for creating a "misunderstanding" about the situation and continued to claim E.coli didn't get in the water in a letter WPTV obtained.
"The unfortunate events that led to the noted violations have served to undermine public trust and confidence in the quality of its water supplies," he wrote to the health department in April.
Low said the violations were the result of procedural missteps by the Riviera Beach Utilities Special District. He said these created water quality uncertainties rather than contamination.
"However, while the zone of water quality uncertainty is limited to a collection of a few customers in the southwestmost fringe of the service area, the widely repeated public commentary is that e-Coli was widespread throughout the system," Low wrote the department in April. "This has resulted in growing claims of gastro-intestinal illnesses, nausea and other ailments that are now being inappropriately attributed to the water supply."
MORE PROBLEMS
Regardless of the report's findings, WPTV found various other issues within the utility over the last year not likely to come up in this specific report.
This includes three other investigations related to breaking water quality laws and at least one other investigation from the Office of the Inspector General's Office in Palm Beach County, which could result in fines worth millions of taxpayer dollars.
