HORNBROOK, Calif. – More than a month after the Klamathon Fire, people in Hornbrook are still feeling its impacts. But, ready or not, school is starting on Wednesday. And while they have water to fill their toilets, and run their sinks, none of it is drinkable.
The Hornbrook School District is working with the State Water Resource Board to get drinkable water.
Hornbrook Superintendent Kelly Bear said, “They have allocated four weeks for of water for use in our kitchen and for consumption for the students.”
And it’s not just the school dealing with a lack of water. The entire community is still without usable drinking water.
Reverend Myron Miller explained, “My whole inside of my home smells like a sewer, the water is stinky.”
Miller lives right next to the school. He says he’s frustrated this problem hasn’t already been solved. “I mean that’s just not right,” he said. “Our kids go here, when we were kids we had water to drink out of the fountains during recess, they can’t even do that.”
He said it’s a problem for the kids and it’s an issue that’s becoming inconvenient and expensive. “we have to go into town,” Miller explained. “We have to go to Walmart and it’s like $5 a case.”
As for the school district, Superintendent Kelly Bear said she’s just ready for things to get back to normal. “It’s been an interesting summer,” she said. “It’s been fire, construction, no water.”
NBC5 reached out to the Hornbrook Community Service District and they say it’s actually up to the state to decide when the water here no longer needs to be boiled.
We reached out to the state but have not heard back.
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