Webster Parish has experienced weather unlike ever before this week. With the snow coming in on Monday and consistent below freezing temperatures making it stick throughout the week, Webster parish and it’s citizens have had to quite literally adapt to this new climate.
Mayor Terry Gardner took the time to clue citizens in on how the city has been weathering the storm.
“City Hall has been open from seven to four all week, will be open our regular hours tomorrow to take bill payments or things like that. All of our departments are working together to keep everybody’s water turned,” said Gardner.
“It looks like we are going to make it in the city with no major problems. Our citizens are the ones that have had most of the damage with frozen water lines, however we have responded quickly to turn off their meters.”
“The Street Department is out salting the roads and putting sand out at all the major intersections, on top of clearing roadways of trees. The fire departments are out turning off different water lines that have busted. But as far as the city’s water, our water plants are working to one hundred percent capacity.”
Luckily, Minden has been able to avoid the blackouts other nearby cities have had to face. “We have had very few power outages. This is due to our tree trimming program we have in place. We have had no problems with our water freezing up at the plant,” said Gardner.
Speaking of damages caused by the storm, Gardner only noted one major water line breaking, which City Employees fixed promptly. “We’ve had one major water line break on Park Highway which we got fixed Wednesday night. That area is under a boil advisory until further notice,” said Gardner.
While Minden hasn’t seen water shortages and power outages like some other areas in the south hit by the storm, the roadways being iced over has provided its own set of challenges for city employees getting to work. As a token of appreciation for their hard work to keep the CIty of Minden up and operational through this emergency, Gardner has been providing them with lunch throughout the week.
We have all been picking up employees and bringing them to work and taking them home in the evenings, so we could take care of all our citizen’s in the city. I’ve been preparing lunch for all the city employees every day for them to pick up. I am blessed as Mayor to have very dedicated department heads and city employees. They have all come together and worked wherever we need them to,” said Gardner.
“But today I couldn’t go to Wal-Mart and get anything because it closed. So I called Jimmy Hall of Grace Estates, and he stepped up and they fixed lunch for all the city employees today.”
“We have kept all of our normal hours open here at city hall with light and water and public works helping man phones and whatever was necessary. I am expecting to be fully staffed on Monday.”
If any citizens are experiencing issues with their utilities due to the weather, contact the city at (318) 377-2144 to get the matter resolved.