The Tijeras Village Council unanimously approved spending $25,000 to repair well 3 when it met Monday evening.
While the well is only a few years old, the cast iron pipe has corroded and there isn’t a warranty in place to cover the costs of a new pipe.
According to Mayor Jake Bruton, the water in the well system contains a “very odd, bacterial kind of thing” that isn’t dangerous to human health, but is damaging the pipe.
“It’s not dangerous to humans or anything like that, but it sure loves to eat up metal,” he said.
Bruton said the village will be replacing the pipe with a different material in an attempt to prevent the corrosion from happening again.
Councilor Ernest Barnes noted that the village is spending a lot of money on its water system despite having relatively few subscribers and he asked what could be done to increase the number of people who are receiving water from the village.
Nathan Mulvihill, the village attorney, has previously looked into that topic and drafted a letter outlining the options. He addressed those once again during the meeting on Monday.
He said the village cannot force people who have existing wells to subscribe to receive water from Tijeras. However, if a well fails and is not able to be repaired, the village can require people to connect to the water system.
The village has tried efforts in the past, such as half-price connection in an attempt to encourage people to connect to the water utility rather than residents waiting for their wells to fail before they connect.
People wishing to connect to the village water utility can fill out an application for public water service, which can be found at tijerasnm.gov/water-department.
Residents and businesses connecting their properties to the water system for the first time do have to pay connection fees. Those fees are $2,000 for a standard meter for a residential customer or $2,600 for a commercial customer. The village does have payment plans available to make the fees easier to afford.
The Village Council also approved putting a water treatment system known as a mixed oxygen system on its new water tank.
Tijeras already uses the system to treat water at the wells, which Bruton said is “way better than us just frequently dumping basically bleach” to treat the water in the wells.
“It’s made from brine. It’s salt, and it just takes a lot less maintenance, takes a lot less cost, and it’s just way easier,” he said.