Residents and businesses of Oakdale are facing yet another issue with the city’s water system.

The city issued a citywide boil advisory last Friday after holes were found in the city’s elevated water tank during a routine inspection, according to Mayor Gene Paul.

“The Louisiana Department of Health came in to inspect the tanks and found a hole in the top of the tank which exposed our water to the weather and other elements,” Paul said.

The hole was discovered by a drone flying over the 40 foot elevated water tank, but may have gone unnoticed for more than a decade due to the amount of rust, he said.

Crews were already in the process of constructing a new storage tank, but that construction is expected to take another four to five weeks to complete, Paul said.

In the meantime, officials are asking residents and businesses to boil tap water for one minute before consuming it, including fountain drinks, making ice, brushing teeth or using it for food preparation. The boil advisory will be lifted once the project is completed and water samples are tested to be safe.

“The state comes in twice a month to sample our water and all the tests have been good,” Paul said. “There are no problems with the water, but it has been exposed to the weather and other elements so we have had to issue the boil advisory.”

The extended boil advisory will put residents and businesses in a tough situation, Paul said.

“We have already been through so much with COVID, the hurricanes and our water system,” he said. “It has put a burden on everyone, especially the businesses. It’s just a bad time.”

Nearly 10,000 water customers in and outside of the city limits are affected by the boil advisory.

Paul says the city is working with its engineers, contractors and the state to complete installation of the new storage tank. The project is 90 percent complete, but will likely not be completed until late May.

“Everything we do is gamble,” he said. “We could have tried to fix this, but we would have had only 30 percent of our water pressure or we could leave it like it is, let us complete the installation of the new tank and still have 100 percent of our water pressure. We didn’t want to be in a situation where we didn’t have any water.”

Paul said residents need to keep in mind the city’s infrastructure is aging with some of it being “very old.”

The city is undergoing a $3.8 million project to improve its water system, including replacing ground storage tanks and rehabilitating existing water wells.

In March, the city declared a state of emergency following a catastrophic water failure with one of the town’s water pumps which left the entire city without water, or low water pressure in some cases, for several days.