On Monday, one week after students living in West Georgetown experienced two power outages, they were faced with yet another utility problem-water pressure in a large area of Northwest D.C. dropped to levels so low that many studentswere left completely without water.
“The problem appears to have been a valve, which we subsequently adjusted,” D.C. Water and Sewer Authority public affairs coordinator Pamela Mooring said.
The valve problem in Northwest coincided with a water main break on 12th Street between O and T, affecting a “pretty wide area of the District,” according to Mooring.
The Office of Campus Housing emailed all students living in Alumni Square, the University townhouses, LXR, and Nevils at 12:50 p.m., almost an hour after the outage began, warning that no water would be available until approximately 5:00 p.m.
However, many residents reported that their water had returned shortly after the email went out.
According to University spokesperson Andy Pino, students whose faucets still yielded a slight trickle of water during the outage could still drink it safely due to mechanisms on the University’s water sources that prevent the backflow of contaminated water.
While some students were inconvenienced by the water outage, more were upset at the combination of utilities problems they have been encountering recently in University-owned housing, where students pay as much as $9,190 per person to live in Nevils for a year, or $8,930 to live in Alumni Square.
Alumni Square resident Kelsey Albro (SFS `09), whose food spoiled during the power outage that started around 1 a.m. on October 27 and lasted nearly six hours, grew increasingly frustrated when she learned of the water outage.
“I feel like we’re being used,” Albro said, referring to her dissatisfaction with the cost of on-campus student housing compared to the services students receive from the University. “They really have us by the cojones here, so to speak. And all we really want is for this stuff to be dependable.”
Karima Tawfik (SFS `09), echoed Albro’s concerns.
“It’s not a big deal really until I think about how much we pay to live here,” Tawfik said. “We understand that there are technical problems, but the lack of communication and the unapologetic tone from the University is seriously annoying.”
