Woman says Rainbow Water failed to notify her and husband of meter work

A Fallbrook woman is upset about the way she says her family was treated when Rainbow Municipal Water District replaced their property's water meter.

Nancy Zucker said she and her husband were never notified that the water district would be replacing her meter, and that the district's actions resulted in her Morro Hills home being left without running water for days and forced the couple to call a plumber – though the water district maintains it has notified all ratepayers whose meters need replacement and that Zucker can file a claim to be reimbursed for the cost of the plumber if it is determined that they did in fact cause the problem she refers to.

The trouble started, Friday, March 19, Zucker said.

"Somewhere in the neighborhood, the company put a sign out saying, 'we're going to do water meter exchange from this date to this date,'" Zucker said. "We didn't pay any attention because it was far down the hill from us."

Zucker said to her knowledge, that was the only notification she received. So she was surprised to come home that Friday to find only "a trickle" of water coming through her faucets.

She said her husband called Rainbow Water about the problem.

"Rainbow was still in touch with my husband saying, 'momentarily it will all be fixed," Zucker said. "Then they said, 'it's your problem, call a plumber."

The Zuckers eventually did get a plumber, who they said uncovered the problem – sediment, Zucker said, had been "blown" into her home's pipes, clogging them and preventing water from flowing.

"The plumber had to clean out fittings and fixtures, take faucets apart, to clean out the sediment that was blown into the system," Zucker said. "We had a trickle from Friday night (March 19) until Wednesday (March 24)."

Rainbow Water did confirm that they replaced the Zuckers' meter – part of a project to replace more than 8,000 meters that district General Manager Tom Kennedy said are aging and often inaccurate."We replaced their meter on a Friday. They called and said they're having some kind of issue ... we checked, and they said – apparently they had water in their upstairs and not their downstairs," Kennedy said. "Our staff had been in contact with them the following week as well. We said, if you've got an issue, you need to call a plumber. If we caused something, we will reimburse you."

Kennedy said the water district directly notifies each and every property owner whose meter is up for replacement.

"We've been notifying everyone by mail directly and also in our newsletters," Kennedy said.

"We've had signs out by streets. Some people don't see it so we've been putting out postcards. So we made sure to send it to just these groups of people and we've had very few complaints."

Zucker still said she never received any direct notification to her property, and that she has not been able to get a call back from the water district.

Kennedy, though, said on March 25 that it had been days since the district heard from the Zuckers.

Zucker said while it only cost about $100 for the plumber, she is more upset about the lack of notification that she says occurred. It's about "the principle," she said.

"The point is, we spend thousands of dollars – I think last year's water bill was $5,800 for the year," she said, noting that her property grows avocados. "It's more than our heating cost, it's more than our electric cost ... it is just unconscionable that a company picks up $6,000 a year and does what they do."

Kennedy said the water district is still more than happy to reimburse the cost of the plumber if they were in fact the cause of the Zucker's problems."If something happened that they feel we caused some damage that they needed to call a plumber, they can file a claim, and if we did cause that then we will cover the claim."

Will Fritz can be reached by email at [email protected].