HERMANN – Hermann’s city administrator last week said an effort will be made to have more residents receive alerts such as the recent one regarding a boil-water order. Only a small amount of the potential recipients received that alert.

City Administrator Patricia Heaney on Tuesday, Sept. 1, told the Hermann Regional Economic Development (HRED) Corporation board that City Hall will encourage greater participation in the notification program, saying an effort will be made to “push people to get signed up on Code Red.”

Heaney earlier told the Gasconade County Republican that of the nearly 1,500 water meters on file in Hermann, only about 300 addresses received the Code Red alert announcing the boil water order. That order was in place for a week, lifted about 9:30 a.m. last Monday morning after the Missouri Department of Natural Resources (DNR) was satisfied that E. Coli contamination found in one water sample had been successfully dealt with and the city’s integrated water system was clear of any contamination.

Many residents received word of the boil-water order through the notification system of the Gasconade County R-1 School District.

In her report on city government presented at the HRED Board of Directors regular monthly session, Heaney noted the community’s patience during the week-long effort to ensure the quality of the city’s drinking water supply. Several samples were sent to DNR for testing – and multiple checks made of the water treatment system made by Public Works Department personnel – before the all-clear was given and signs taken down from drinking fountains in schools and businesses and soda - and coffee-dispensing machines throughout towns.

Heaney noted that the public took the prolonged inconvenience in stride. “A lot of people have been very gracious,” she said. “DNR is all about public safety and so are we,” she added.

Meanwhile, R-1 Superintendent Geoff Neill, one of the 15 members of the HRED board, noted that the school year is off and running with student enrollment still edging down.

“I would anticipate the trend continues,” he said.

He expressed appreication to the Hermann Police Department for being on hand at the start of the school year near the entrance to the high school and middle school campuses, which are directly across Highway 100 West from Saw Mill Road, the local highway providing access to dump trucks and tractor-trailer rigs hauling rock from a quarry to data center development sites in Montgomery County. Neill had expressed concern about safety of student drivers entering and leaving the campus on school days while the heavy trucks are coming and going from the quarry.

But at the outset of the school year, it appears the mix of big trucks, school buses and students’ vehicles on the road seems to be going smoothly, he said.

American Family Insurance agency and HRED Board Vice President Raylene Hollrah noted that site work is taking place in an area along Bavarian Plaza Drive near See Tall subdivision to prepare for the construction of 21 single-family homes. Hollrah is involved in the project, along with developer Steve Vollmer. Those housing units will be three-bedroom, two-bathroom homes. “They’re going to be nice homes,” Hollrah said. “We want families to move into them,” she added.

The multi-family housing development near Hermann Elementary School continues with the first units initially scheduled to be finished earlier this summer.