The Challenge
The city of Hurley, WI, didn’t have a formal cross-connection control program in the 2000s. As a small community with resources stretched thin, cross-connection control wasn’t a priority—that is, until Wisconsin’s Department of Natural Resources (DNR) began pushing for compliance. “It just fell by the wayside,” explains Gary Laguna, operator in charge of water and wastewater for the city of Hurley. “We kept getting pressure from the DNR about our system being in non-compliance. The biggest thing that spooked me was the liability.”
Three years later, at the next sanitary survey, the DNR labeled Hurley non-compliant again, this time with a significant deficiency. “I was overwhelmed, quite honestly. I didn’t know where to start,” Laguna says. And with limited staffing and competing priorities, getting a program up and running on their own wasn’t an option. “We’re swamped here. There’s no time to manage all these things.”
“I consider [working with HydroCorp] a very good partnership.”
– Gary Laguna
Operator in Charge of Water & Wastewater, City of Hurley
The Solution
In 2010, following a change in administration, the city of Hurley partnered with HydroCorp to establish and manage their commercial cross-connection control program. “We got the chance to partner with HydroCorp to reduce our liability, to bring us into compliance with the state,” Laguna explains, “They drew up a very comprehensive plan—all the T’s were crossed and all the I’s were dotted.”
The HydroCorp team now conducts almost 50 commercial surveys each year for the city. “We have nursing homes here, we have schools,” Laguna says. But it’s not just on-site work that HydroCorp helps with: “Having HydroCorp keep track of all of our customers, what needs to be done, and when things need to be done” streamlined Hurley’s program.
In 2022, the city expanded their partnership with HydroCorp to undertake a meter replacement project. While HydroCorp technicians were on-site at residential properties, they also completed residential surveys, sump pump inspections, and service line inventory. “HydroCorp’s technicians come up, and they’re certified. They catalogued who had sump pumps, whose sump pumps were discharged into sanitary, what kind of line customers had coming in,” Laguna says. “That was a really big help.”
“We got the chance to partner with HydroCorp to reduce our liability, to bring us into compliance with the state.”
– Gary Laguna
Operator in Charge of Water & Wastewater, City of Hurley
The Result
The meter replacement project, now complete, saw more than 780 meters installed and 734 residential inspections completed. By combining utility activities into a single visit, the city of Hurley improved meter technology and billing accuracy while ensuring a safe water system in a single visit—all with minimal disruption to customers. Today, Hurley’s commercial program boasts an 88% compliance rate after 15 years of educating the community and creating repeated touchpoints in the cross-connection control program.
“For the most part, I’ve handled the compliance side of things myself,” explains Laguna. But working with HydroCorp “frees up time” to focus on other core responsibilities. Now in compliance with DNR regulations since the implementation of the program in 2010, the city of Hurley has peace of mind that the water system is protected from backflow contamination and that they’re safe from liability. “I consider [working with HydroCorp] a very good partnership.”
