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>Date: Sat, 3 Nov 2007 22:21:43 -0400
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>Subject: [Crossingthebridge] orme tennessee
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>Tenn. Town Has Run Out of Water
>
>By GREG BLUESTEIN - 2 days ago
>
>ORME, Tenn. (AP) - As twilight falls over this Tennessee town, Mayor Tony
>Reames drives up a dusty dirt road to the community's towering water tank
>and
>begins his nightly ritual in front of a rusty metal valve.
>
>With a twist of the wrist, he releases the tank's meager water supply, and
>suddenly this sleepy town is alive with activity. Washing machines whir,
>kitchen
>sinks fill and showers run.
>
>About three hours later, Reames will return and reverse the process, cutting
>off water to the town's 145 residents.
>
>The severe drought tightening like a vise across the Southeast has
>threatened the water supply of cities large and small, sending politicians
>scrambling
>for solutions. But Orme, about 40 miles west of Chattanooga and 150 miles
>northwest of Atlanta, is a town where the worst-case scenario has already
>come
>to pass: The water has run out.
>
>The mighty waterfall that fed the mountain hamlet has been reduced to a
>trickle, and now the creek running through the center of town is dry.
>
>Three days a week, the volunteer fire chief hops in a 1961 fire truck at
>5:30 a.m. - before the school bus blocks the narrow road - and drives a few
>miles
>to an Alabama fire hydrant. He meets with another truck from nearby New
>Hope, Ala. The two drivers make about a dozen runs back and forth, hauling
>about
>20,000 gallons of water from the hydrant to Orme's tank.
>
>"I'm not God. I can't make it rain. But I'll get you the water I can get
>you," Reames tells residents.
>
>Between 6 and 9 every evening, the town scurries. Residents rush home from
>their jobs at the carpet factories outside town to turn on washing machines.
>Mothers start cooking supper. Fathers fill up water jugs. Kids line up to
>take showers.
>
>"You never get used to it," says Cheryl Evans, a 55-year-old who has lived
>in town all her life. "When you're used to having water and you ain't got
>it,
>it's strange. I can't tell you how many times I've turned on the faucet
>before remembering the water's been cut."
>
>"You have to be in a rush," she says. "At 6 p.m., I start my supper, turn on
>my washer, fill all my water jugs, take my shower."
>
>During its peak in the 1930s, Orme (rhymes with "storm") boasted a
>population of thousands, a jail, three schools and a hotel. But those boom
>times are
>long gone.
>
>After the coal miners went on strike in the 1940s, the company shut down the
>mine and the town has never been the same. Not a single business is left in
>Orme. The only reminder of the town's glory days is an aging wooden rail
>depot that sits three feet above the eerily quiet streets.
>
>Although changes are coming - cable TV arrived just a few years ago - cell
>phones still don't work there. The main road into town is barely wide enough
>for two cars to pass one another. Dogs wander the streets, farm animals can
>be heard all around town, and kids gather outside the one-room City Hall to
>ride their bikes.
>
>"It's like walking back in time. It's Never-Never Land here," says Ernie
>Dawson, a 47-year-old gospel singer who grew up in Orme.
>
>Water restrictions in Orme are nothing new. But residents say it's never
>been this bad.
>
>Even last summer, as the water supply dwindled, city leaders cut off water
>only at night. But in August, Reames took the most extreme step yet and
>restricted
>use to three hours a day.
>
>Elected in December, he has now spent $8,000 of the city's $13,000 annual
>budget to deal with the crisis. Most of the money went toward trucking water
>from
>Alabama.
>
>He has tried to fill the gaps with modest fundraisers, but it hasn't been
>easy. A Halloween carnival last week cleared about $375 and a dog show two
>weeks
>ago made $300.
>
>The town has received a $377,590 emergency grant from the U.S. Department of
>Agriculture that Reames hopes will be Orme's salvation. A utility crew is
>laying
>a 2 1/2-mile pipe to connect Orme to the Bridgeport, Ala., water supply. The
>work could be finished by Thanksgiving.
>
>"It's not a short-term solution," Reames says. "It is THE solution."
>
>He says the crisis in Orme could serve as a warning to other communities to
>conserve water before it's too late.
>
>"I feel for the folks in Atlanta," he says, his gravelly voice barely rising
>above the sound of rushing water from the town's tank. "We can survive.
>We're
>145 people. You've got 4.5 million people down there. What are they going to
>do? It's a scary thought."
>
>
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