Belle Plaine sits in an area of eastern Iowa that’s considered in exceptional drought and city administrator Stephen Beck says officials are hoping to find new ways to bolster the city’s dwindling water supply.
“We cannot afford to put a well into the Jordan Aquifer and historically our system has worked, it just needs to be enhanced,” Beck says, “so our proposal that we’re looking at is to recreate a wetland and restore a wetland that had been drained by a local landowner that had property adjacent to the well field.”
The four shallow wells in that area are operating at about 20% of previous capacity, so Belle Plaine has had to rely on a deep well — dug in 1988 – that in the past was only used periodically. There’s not enough water to flush the town’s water distribution system, so brownish water is flowing from some faucets.
“It’s intermittent. It’s in different parts of town. Certain areas aren’t affected at all. Other areas that have older infrastructure are more susceptible to having discolored water because we are not able to flush out our water mains,” Beck says. “Normally, we would flush those twice a year to remove any sediment.”
The water in Belle Plaine is being treated and it meets federal drinking water standards, but the State of Iowa’s Department of Homeland Security and Fareway Stores are providing bottled water to the community. Pallets of water now fill the garage at Belle Plaine’s police station. “The citizens do not want to drink discolored water. I do not drink discolored water and when the water’s not clear, I want the community to have an option of drinking clear drinking water,” Beck says.
The Iowa Department of Natural Resources has awarded Belle Plaine a $250,000 grant to begin reviving the wetlands around the four wells that had been its primary source of drinking water. Belle Plaine is exploring construction of a small reservoir that would feed into the wetlands, where native plants would filter out nitrogen. “And then filter down through the sand and soil and rock and gravel pack and all of those things to just do a natural treatment,” Beck says.
That’s far cheaper than digging more than a thousand feet to reach the Jordan aquifer.