LAFAYETTE COUNTY, MS (abc24.com) - Fears of contamination and complaints of too many chemicals. Residents of a rural area outside Oxford are scared to drink the water.
Five to seven hundred people use a system cited by the state health department for serious violations.
"You can't stand it," Ted Huckabee told abc24.com. "It smells and you can't drink it."
"When I do take a sip or a mouthful I have to spit it out," said Faye Littlejohn. "If I drink some it cramps my stomach."
Huckabee and Littlejohn can't do anything around their house without being reminded of their water problems.
"Sometimes you take a shower and you can smell the chlorine after you get out of it," Huckabee told abc24.com. "She's actually taken clothes out of the washer and dryer and you can smell the chlorine in the clothes."
The couple lives in Lafayette County, two of several hundred people depending on the Lafayette Springs Water Association to provide clean drinking water. It's the same company the state health department cited four times for violating water regulations, some are for failing to properly monitor the water.
"They're way over doing that chemical thing," said Littlejohn.
She's installed a filter on her kitchen sink, but isn't confident it's removing all the dangers.
"The filter is good for no more than three weeks and it's plugged up and we have to replace it," Huckabee told abc24.com.
Local firefighters told abc24.com all of the area's water was formerly supplied by a small pumping station. A water tower was recently added to increase water pressure. That was about a year ago. Shortly after the couple began noticing problems.
The health department's testing violations were finalized in April 2011. Littlejohn worries about something that happened to her mom that same month.
"My mom went in the hospital for a week with an infection that I heard had to do with the water maybe," said Littlejohn.
She's spoken about the problem with elected officials on the town's water board, but hasn't gotten any answers.
"No, they don't tell us anything," said Huckabee.
Employees with Lafayette Springs Water Association refused to answer any questions about the violations. In the meantime, Littlejohn and Huckabee are left with few choices, and are stocking up on bottled water.
Lafayatte Springs Water is one of just three water providers that were cited with four Mississippi state violations in 2011.
