Break-ins at water tower, reservoir probed

A water tower serving a new, upscale housing development in east Spokane was broken into recently and possibly contaminated with coliform bacteria. Across the state line, the Kootenai County Sheriff’s Office is investigating a similar break-in to a water reservoir near Hauser.

Both water systems were later found to be contaminated, forcing users to boil their water or drink bottled water.

The intrusions were confirmed Friday by the East Spokane Water District and a member of the Hauser Lake Water Association. Although no officials are suggesting deliberate contamination or that the cases are related, law enforcement and water officials are exploring those possibilities. Authorities also said they do not believe the cases are related to this week’s E.coli contamination in north Spokane or to the toxic chemical recently found in a well in Colbert.

At the water tower in east Spokane, located high above the Broadmore Estates housing development near 25th Avenue and Glenrose Road, somebody dug under a fence a few weeks ago and broke the lock on a hatch that allows access inside the water tower, said Rick Adkins, of the East Spokane Water District. The tower serves fewer than a dozen homes, with more on the way as development increases. Residents were given bottled water while the tower was flushed and the water was chlorinated.

Kootenai County Sheriff’s detectives are investigating why two screens were torn from overflow vents on a water reservoir on the east side of Hauser Lake on Liree Road. Nobody from the Sheriff’s Department was available for comment Friday, but Wesley Michael, a director of the Hauser Lake Water Association who has had his water affected by the contamination, said he had seen the damage to the screens.

On Sept. 22, a test showed that there was E.coli in the water supply coming from the reservoir, said Michael, who is also a security guard for The Spokesman-Review. Residents have been on a water “boil order” since then, and the tank will be cleaned today, he said.

The operator of the Hauser tank, Joe Leigh, said he doubts the contamination is intentional.

“I think it was just from natural causes, or maybe a bird or something got into a tank,” he said.

Harmful bacteria can show up in a water supply if animals or birds fall into a tank of water. No animals were found in the east Spokane tower, and when officials drain the Hauser reservoir today, they’ll check to see if anything is inside. Once the screens were torn from the overflow vents, anything could have gotten into the water supply, Michael said.The Spokane break-in occurred in a multimillion-dollar housing development, Adkins said.

“The fact that someone got on the tower and cut the lock was scary enough,” Adkins said. “Obviously, somebody intended to do something if they spent the time to climb the ladder and cut the hatch to get in there.”

Finding bad test results right after the vandalism was “kind of ironic,” Adkins said, “when I’ve been running pretty clean lately.”

The FBI looked into the vandalism, but is not investigating any further, said FBI spokeswoman Robbie Burroughs.

“There’s no indication that there are federal violations or acts of domestic terrorism,” she said.

Nobody from the Spokane County Sheriff’s Department was available for comment Friday about the Broadmore Estate incident.

An official with the state Department of Health said special attention is now paid to these kinds of incidents.

“Over the years it’s not unusual for kids to break into a reservoir,” said Dan Sander, a regional manager with the Department of Health’s office of drinking water. “But since 9/11, we take those reservoir incidents very seriously.”

Adkins said he’ll now keep a closer eye on the water tower and plans to install a new security system.