VENTURA : Order to Boil Tap Water Is Lifted for Residents

An alert for about 250 residents in hillside homes above Ventura High School to boil their household water before using it was lifted Saturday after water samples turned up no presence of bacteria.

Ventura Water Supt. Steve Wilson cleared the way for residents in those areas to once again use and consume water without boiling it.

An electrical failure caused the Mariano tank that supplies water to the area to run out at noon Friday, resulting in the alert to boil water.

The problem was detected and corrected within 30 minutes, but the city is required to advise residents to boil water any time a reservoir tank drops below a certain level.

Officials said the danger was that the loss of pressure might allow a hose or other outlet to draw water back into the system.

Samples of the water were taken, but the results take 24 hours to process, so the warning to boil water could not be lifted until the samples came back negative for bacteria Saturday.

The advisory affected about 85 homes between Lincoln Drive to the west, Catalina Street to the east, Hillcrest Drive to the north and Poli Street to the south.