Video by Ricky Kerr
By JAMES BELL
Hays Post
VICTORIA — Almost within throwing distance of Victoria, Kevin and Laura McCarter have restored a destitute homestead first built 112 years ago and, up until recently, the couple had a modern luxury in the old house: drinking water. But after 10 months of research, questions, money and meetings, the couple still can’t drink the water at their home after the Victoria City Council refused to vote on running water service to the home.
“At the last city council meeting, it was supposed to be put to a vote. It never got that far,” Kevin McCarter said.
City Council member Leroy Schmidtberger motioned for a vote during the meeting but there was no second, effectively ending the measure without a vote by the council.
“Numerous people there asked why they wouldn’t allow us to get water and there was silence. They wouldn’t respond to anything,” McCarter said.
Ultimately one council member did give the McCarters an answer – they should have never bought the house, despite the couple having owned the home for 12 years.
“About 12 years ago, we totally restored the house. We’re in the process of getting it on the state and natural registry,” McCarter said.
Part of the restoration efforts to make the home livable was digging water wells and, for more than 10 years, the wells provided the couple what they needed, until something changed recently.
The couple drilled three wells when restoration began, with two producing “great water,” McCarter said, and had been approved by the EPA as safe for consumption.
Ten months ago, however, the couple noticed the water quality had changed. After looking at their commercial grade water-softening system and finding no issues, they sent samples for testing.
Those tests found the water from both wells were full of salts, sulfates and particulate matter, making another well on the property unavailable to the couple.
“I’ve been told by numerous water people, KDHE, Kansas Rural Water Association and others, it’s astronomical how high our numbers are,” McCarter said.
The couple then tried to get on area rural water districts, but were rebuffed due to the homes proximity to Victoria.
That’s when the long odyssey with the city began.
McCarter said the couple first was told the property and the neighboring household would first need annexed into the city, something the couple was willing to do. Then he said they were told only their property would need annexed, later confirmed not to be true.
“The water districts provided a state statue that stated that the city has the right to provide us water even without annexing us in,” McCarter said.
Despite initial actions, the couple still tried to work with the city.
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“We’ve been to numerous meetings with the city. We’ve met all their demands,” McCarter said, referring to a two-page list of requirements provided to them.
“Every time the meetings are thrown off by totally bogus things,” McCarter said. At one point, the couple was told they would have to run a water loop from the football field, only later to find “the state engineer actually signed off saying that wasn’t the case.”
The reasons for the constant push back are still a mystery to the couple but McCarter believes “its seems to be they are trying to drive the cost up, to keep us from doing things.”
McCarter said the Victoria mayor has been supportive to the plight.
“The mayor, Jerry Kanzenbach, has been a big advocate for us from the start. He publicly said if he could bring a garden hose to us he would,” he said.
RELATED: Mayor calls for action on couple’s plight.
In the City of Victoria, however, the mayor is an elected office and has no vote on the council, except in the case of a tie, and cannot second a motion to vote.
“There was nobody apposed to it in the audience. It was confirmed that we had met all their listed criteria,” McCarter said, including inspections for hazardous materials on site. “In the end, after all that, then it was not put to a vote.”
Surprisingly, the challenge faced by the McCarter’s is exclusive to the couple, others within a half mile of the city are currently on the city’s water system that don’t pay city taxes, something the McCarters say they are willing to do.
“One of the city commissioners, on the board, actually grew up in one of the annexed houses that the city paid money to provide water for, they spent almost $30,000 to bring water to them,” McCarter said.
“Her dad is in charge of the water here in town. He lives in the house and she is on the board. It’s a new house, but this has been here 112 years. That should mean something.”
“We just want to be treated fairly, McCarter said. “We want to move on with our lives, continue to restore this place and be a positive part of the community.”
The move to speak publicly didn’t come easy for the McCarters, but after 10 months, the need to have access to clean water drove them to speak out.
“We felt after this meeting it was time to say something,” McCarter said. “We’re not able to use drinking water all. We haven’t used drinking water for a long time and technically not supposed to be using it to shower in, but we do because we have no other option at this point.”
The water, isn’t just affecting the couple, but the property as well.
“Along with the water contamination comes numerous other problems,” McCarter said. “We have an industrial system that’s designed for our water that literally can’t handle it.”
That system recently failed, causing water to flood the basement and one bathroom in the home to become unusable. The couple has also replaced several inline water heaters in recent months and the water is so toxic it kills plants on the property.
“Literally, I can water a tree today and it will be dead tomorrow,” McCarter said. “We planted 50 oak tress, and I watered them in and they are all dead except two.”
After all of the wrangling to get fresh water, McCarter is still hopeful the town he has called home for over a decade will do the right thing so everyone can move forward.
The line needed to get water to the home is “possibly 200 yards at most,” McCarter said.