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Well, well, well: Polk Middle School kitchen shut down amid problems with school's well water

Polk Middle School water

Courtesy of Abby Morehea

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It started with a trickle.

Here and there, student teacher John Rojas said his students at Polk Middle School were making comments 鈥 鈥溾楬ey, the water tastes funny,鈥 or, 鈥楬ey, the water looks like this.鈥 鈥

But a little over two weeks ago, comments that the water tasted, looked and smelled odd started pouring in.

And on Sept. 27, the school community got a letter from Principal Ben Bustos 鈥 the South Valley school鈥檚 cafeteria was being ordered to cease operations after a county inspector found the water coming out of the faucets of the school cafeteria was coming out a 鈥渂rown or rust color.鈥

鈥淚f we鈥檙e asking the students to come to a school and participate in learning, we need to provide an environment 鈥 for learning,鈥 Rojas said. 鈥淚t has to have clean water, it has to be a safe building, it has to have working lights, it should have air conditioning and heating 鈥 those kinds of basic needs.鈥

Bernalillo County forced the school鈥檚 kitchen to shut down and instead serve cold lunches shuttled into Polk from the district鈥檚 central kitchen. The closure lasted only days before the red sticker was removed and cooking could resume.

Still, Bustos said in the letter that during a regular test in early September, the water came back as safe for consumption, and that 鈥渁t no time has the water tested unsafe.鈥

According to documents provided by Albuquerque Public Schools Chief Operations Officer Gabriella Blakey, that was true even of a test conducted right after the kitchen was shut down.

Blakey noted that while there was a red sticker on the door, the kitchen wasn鈥檛 officially red-tagged 鈥 just ordered to cease operations 鈥渦ntil it is determined the water is safe to use.鈥

鈥淎t no time was anybody ever in danger,鈥 she said. 鈥淚t was kind of (preemptive) of the health inspector, I think, to turn it off 鈥 because it was for water discoloration. It wasn鈥檛 for unsafe water.鈥

Blakey also said Polk typically has had discolored water and, which 鈥渄oesn鈥檛 necessarily mean it鈥檚 unsafe.鈥 District Maintenance and Operations Executive Director John Dufay said the discoloration comes from extra sand in the water, which could be a side effect of the water table dropping or of problems with the well鈥檚 casing, which helps keep dirt out.

Despite assurances that the water is safe, Rojas has told his students not to drink the water, 鈥渂ecause I don鈥檛 know what鈥檚 in it.鈥

鈥淚 wouldn鈥檛 drink that,鈥 he said, 鈥渟o why would I have them drink it?鈥

Polk is one of roughly a dozen APS schools still on well water of any kind, Dufay said.

The district is now trying to fast-track getting Polk connected to the city-county water system, an estimated $440,000 undertaking that typically takes months but which APS is applying for as an emergency health and safety issue with the Water Utility Authority.

鈥淭he contractor and everything is pretty much ready to mobilize within a few days or a week or so 鈥 we just have to get everything authorized through the Water Authority,鈥 Dufay said. 鈥淲e just want to push that process quickly.鈥