While I subscribe to the NY Times, I still check the Atlanta Journal-Constitution daily online to get local info.  This allows me to avoid the local “newscasts” which, like most local TV “news” in any American city is simply entertainment, interspersed with 5 teases about the weather in a 30 minute time span.  I had checked the online version in the late morning on Saturday and then again on Sunday at about the same time.  On Sunday, there was an article that my county had been under a Boil Water Advisory because a valve had blown in the water processing plant, causing the water to be at low levels where bacteria could potentially be introduced.  While this doesn’t happen often, it does occur every once in a while in every city I’ve lived.

Here is where the problem resides.  I surely hope that the local TV news shows could interrupt their local news updates about another local R&B star’s hijinks or some suburban mom complaining about the demonic Harry Potter and actually inform the area of this Boil Water Advisory.  The situation happened on Thursday, yet there was nothing online (where a lot of people get their info now) until Sunday.  By Sunday afternoon, the advisory had been lifted but the fact remains most of the county probably wasn’t aware that we shouldn’t be drinking the water until the advisory had been lifted.

This was even more annoying since we had Ally’s 3^rd birthday party on Saturday and some people were drinking water and all the ice obviously came from the same source.  Did our water filter get out the impurities?  Who knows?  Thankfully no one got sick that we know of but by then the dangerous water was in the system for almost 2 days.  I don’t care if it’s the weekend – get the word out when public health is potentially threatened.  Do what it takes, whether it is via the internet, newspaper, radio, TV (via an actual news item or text crawl on the bottom of the screen), cable messages, or flyers on each door.

With the amount of “Messages” I get as a Comcast user telling me about useful things such as the Ultimate Fighting Championship on Pay Per View or any other Retardo Event of the Week, it would be just as easy for them to get out a message to the county residents about something important such as a Boil Advisory.  This way we can avoid potential ingestion of cryptosporidium or wage a losing battle with the Hershey Squirts for several days.