Wellton warns of four-hour water outage for east side Monday

Water was set to go off for four hours on Wellton’s east side, affecting everyone east of Dome Street on both sides of Los Angeles Avenue while the town pushed ahead with its retention basin and storm drainage project. The interruption was scheduled for 8 a.m. to noon Monday, giving households and small businesses a narrow window to store water and plan around cooking, bathing and other basic needs.

The town’s notice, posted June 4, said the outage was part of ongoing infrastructure work rather than an emergency. Still, the impact was sharply defined: all residents east of Dome Street, north and south of Los Angeles Avenue, were in the affected area. By spelling out the location and four-hour time frame, Wellton tried to keep the interruption from becoming a surprise for the neighborhood most likely to feel it first.

The service cut was the latest sign that the retention basin and drainage work is not a single isolated project, but part of a wider round of public works activity around the Los Angeles Avenue corridor. In January, the town said it was installing a new water service line behind the motel along Los Angeles Avenue to serve residences on San Jose Avenue, with possible road closures and lane restrictions around Maybelle Street. Around the same time, the Town Council also had a HURF exchange agreement on the agenda for the Williams Street Improvements Project from Oakland Avenue to Los Angeles Avenue.

Wellton has also been dealing with broader water concerns this spring. On March 26, the town said its system had violated the Total Trihalomethanes standard after the 4th quarter of 2025 averaged 0.111 mg/L, above the 0.080 mg/L limit. Town officials said the issue was not an emergency, that no boil-water action was needed, and that they were working with the Arizona Department of Environmental Quality, engineers and treatment changes to resolve the problem within the next year.

A Water Information Community Meeting on April 8 at the Wellton Community Center, 10234 Dome St., was used to update residents on the town’s water system, current projects and water quality information. That context matters in a town whose 2024 Consumer Confidence Report says its drinking water comes from a blend of Colorado River surface water supplied through the Wellton-Mohawk Irrigation & Drainage District canal system and one groundwater well.

Wellton’s Public Works Department says it maintains the town’s water system, streets, roads, drainage and town-owned facilities, a reminder that Monday’s outage was tied to the same local infrastructure network that keeps the community running. For residents east of Dome Street, the immediate task was simple: fill containers ahead of time and expect the tap to go dry until noon.