Thank You

THANK YOU! To all who came out to volunteer, donate & participate at our annual 4th of July Fundraiser. We are about $20K closer to our goal. Our next fundraiser will be our GUN RAFFLE & CHILI SUPPER in December. We hope to see you there!

Sincerely,
Port O’Connor Volunteer Fire Department

Yes, God Heals!

Dear Coastal Bend Readers,

In March of 2018, I was having a reaction to something I had eaten. Thinking heart attack, I went to Memorial Medical Center Emergency Room in Port Lavaca. To my surprise they said, “Well, Mr. Cain, no heart attack for you, but we found a tumor on your right kidney.”

God led me in there and then to the best possible place, MD Anderson in Houston, for many more tests, biopsies and x-rays. When I got back to Port Lavaca, the Swing Bed and Rehab Wing at MMC Port Lavaca was a very wonderful experience…the best care imaginable. Thank you, Dr. Richard Arroyo-Diaz of Memorial Medical Port Lavaca and Dr. John Papadopoulos of M. D. Anderson, for your care and concern throughout my illness.

My sincere thanks to all of our churches for your many prayers and thoughts, for the masses said. God asks for our praise and for us to tell others what he has done. Thank you again for everyone’s prayers. It seems God still has more work for me to do on this earth.

Russell Cain
Port Lavaca

Letter to the Dolphin Talk

The Port O’Connor Improvement District is aware of an article published in the Victoria Advocate on June 30, 2018.

On behalf of the Board of Directors and as President of that organization, I feel it is important for the District’s customers to know that the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality, or TCEQ, has not claimed that the District has delivered to customers unsafe water from its public drinking water system, or that it has improperly treated wastewater at its wastewater treatment facility.

The District takes its obligations to its customers seriously and owes it to those customers to set the record straight.

We have had numerous discussions with TCEQ promptly after its representatives conducted facility investigations beginning in February 2018. In correspondence TCEQ sent the Board in mid-May and in discussions between Board and TCEQ representatives, TCEQ has acknowledged that the Board is in the process of correcting the few items it has not already corrected following the inspection TCEQ conducted in March of this year.

The issue TCEQ has indicated through a spokesperson that is of primary concern relates to the size of certain of the District’s water supply lines. Prior to TCEQ’s inspection, the District had already been working with the Texas Water Development Board, through Project 21750, to use a contractor to replace certain small-diameter water supply lines with larger diameter lines. However, the Board has brought to the Water Development Board’s and to TCEQ’s attention the failures to comply with certain project specifications of a contractor it had hired in March 2016. Those performance issues have caused delays, but they have been corrected by TWDB Change Order No. 1. Therefore, the completion of the line replacement project will ensure that the District satisfies both TCEQ and the Water Development Board.

The District no longer relies on an outside contractor to operate the District’s water system, and therefore it performs those, and other, required tasks itself. For that reason, the District has ensured that it will provide TCEQ with monthly documentation that it flushes dead end water mains where those mains are installed with flush valves.

Finally, the District is in the process of demonstrating to TCEQ’s satisfaction that it verifies the accuracy of handheld chlorine disinfectant measuring equipment. As is the case with documentation of proper dead end main flushing, the District is able to be certain that it provides documentation of such verification.

The District takes seriously the responsibilities it owes its customers. It is important that we be able to ensure that our customers and the general public have a complete picture of the actions we take to satisfy all environmental, health and safety requirements. Actions speak louder than words, and our work with the TCEQ and Water Development Board will demonstrate those commitments.

Leon S. Brown, Jr., President
Port O’Connor Improvement District

The Dolphin welcomes letters from our readers on any subject that is of general interest to our audience. Letters should be 300 words or less (with exceptions at the Dolphin’s discretion). Letters reflect the opinion of the writer, and not that of Dolphin Talk staff, and we retain the right to determine suitability for publication. It is the policy of this newspaper to promote area interests: therefore, complaints against local businesses should be directed elsewhere. Letters must be signed and include day and evening phone numbers, which will not be published. Your name will be withheld upon request, but anonymous material will not be considered for publication.
Letters to the Dolphin:
Dolphin Talk
P.O. Box 777 Port O’Connor, TX 77982 dolphin1@tisd.net