Rain Improves McMinnville Water Supply

Recent rainfall has been a major boon for McMinnville’s water supply.

Water and Wastewater Department Director Ricky Morton the rain brought the dam’s water level back up to the point where water is spilling over. Morton said the water level had been down six to eight inches on the backside of the dam.

“We wound up with over five inches of rain,” Morton said. “Which definitely, you know, it just helped. Those slow rains, that helps replenish our water supply versus these big heavy rains where it just washes off in the river and it’s runoff to where we can get that water table back up, so this was definitely welcomed.”

Morton said they still had a large supply of water beforehand but the rains provide much fresher water for locals to use. Morton said they still need more rain to reach the water levels they usually see at the dam.

“Usually we’ve got a good, I would say three to four inches flowing over the dam,” Morton said. “And it’s coming over, but it’s not like it’s back to what we would normally see.”

Morton said the rain is also helpful because they sometimes have to change their treatment techniques in drought conditions to prevent it from tasting bad.

“Even with the drought we didn’t have any issues to where we would have to ask people to cut back on water or anything like that,” Morton said. “We still had plenty of water, it’s just changing our treatment strategies.”

Morton said the potential change in taste is due to the bleach they have to add to disinfect warm water in the summer.