Boil water notices, low tank emergencies, and what the West Travis County PUA's own board record says about the cause, the fix, and the dates that matter.
LAST UPDATED: AUGUST 27, 2026 · SYSTEM: WTCPUA (PWS TX2270235, ROUGHLY 20,000 CONNECTIONS)
Boil water notice on the Highway 290 system after storage tanks fell to critical levels during high demand.
Boil water notice issued during transmission main maintenance.
PUA public statement: plant limited to 20 MGD, expansion to 33 MGD delayed by permitting and design complications, new plant then scheduled for early 2028. Stage 2 watering restrictions retained due to limited plant capacity.
Board adopts FY26 budget and the first retail water rate adjustment since 2017, effective November 2025, citing long-term infrastructure and reliability.
Systemwide boil water notice after treated water turbidity exceeded the state standard, indicating the plant's filters were not performing as required. The utility's 2025 water quality report later confirmed this as a health-based Treatment Technique violation on November 24 (see the water quality record).
General Manager tells the board the PUA cannot serve additional customers until new supplies are identified. Commercial service extension applications halted; waiting list begins.
Engineers tell the board that delivery dates for four Highway 290 system capital projects will not be met. The Reunion Ranch WCID board formally requests a written accounting of the causes of these incidents, corrective actions, and the timeline to meet full demand.
Boil water notice after a water main break.
Board agenda includes a firm water supply agreement with GBRA (the WaterSECURE project), a Texas Water Development Board grant application, and a director's item on engaging additional engineering firms to keep priority projects on schedule. Engineer's report: expansion at the 60 percent design milestone, completion December 2027, plus a study of an interim 0.5 MGD connection from Travis County MUD 4.
Emergency notice: discontinue all irrigation, tank levels extremely low.
Boil water notice for Hamilton Pool Road customers.
Stage 3 watering restrictions take effect. The PUA's alert states the trigger plainly: under its Drought Contingency Plan, Stage 3 may be implemented "when the 20% reduction target established under Stage 2 is not achieved." In other words, Stage 2 conservation did not work.
Systemwide boil water notice due to low water pressure. Second emergency notice in five days.
Residents across the Hamilton Pool Road corridor woke to little or no water pressure, with single digit PSI readings at some homes and others out of water entirely. As of that morning, no public notice had been issued. The outage reached the schools: Bee Cave Middle School lost water pressure completely, closed campus restrooms, and offered early student pickup, and Lake Travis ISD placed Rough Hollow Elementary, Bee Cave Middle, and Lake Travis Middle under boil water protocols, shutting off fountains and hand washing stations and distributing bottled water, per notices sent to families that day. That same day, the PUA published overnight metering data for the system (next section).
On August 27, 2026, the same day residents woke to little or no pressure, the PUA published a news release, "Why Our Water Tanks Remain Low and How You Can Help," containing the system's own metering data for the previous night. It is the most direct published evidence of where the water goes. In the utility's own figures:
Two things follow from the utility's own data. First, sustained draws of that size, hour after hour through the night, are the signature of programmed irrigation timers running on schedule, not people out with hoses. If your controller has an overnight program, it is part of this. Second, the release demonstrates that the system's metering can identify irrigation-scale use hour by hour. That raises a fair question about enforcement, because the PUA's adopted Drought Contingency Plan prescribes an exact penalty ladder for violations: a written notice, then a $500 surcharge, then $1,000, then disconnection. Whether that ladder is being used, and how often, is the subject of a pending public records request.
Through the same August emergency, residents along Hamilton Pool Road repeatedly documented commercial water-hauling trucks filling from fire hydrants inside the service area, including on the morning of August 27, hours after homes in the corridor lost pressure.
What the utility's adopted plan says. The PUA's Drought Contingency Plan addresses hydrants directly. In Stage 3, "use of water from fire hydrants shall be limited to firefighting and activities necessary to maintain public health, safety and welfare," with construction use allowed only under an approved variance and meter. In Stage 4 emergencies, hydrant use is limited to firefighting only, and no new meters of any kind may be approved. Stage 3 has been in effect since August 25.
What the utility has said so far, per communications relayed to customers through a homeowners association in August 2026: a commercial water hauler purchased a meter directly from WTCPUA; the utility estimates that hauler's usage as approximately equivalent to one residential household; the utility has temporarily placed a halt on that meter; and bulk water meters are granted for four months at a time, after which vendors must reapply.
What remains unanswered, and is now formally pending: how much water has been withdrawn from hydrants by haulers, by month; who purchases it and where it goes; what revenue the sales generate; and what operational thresholds, if any, suspend bulk sales when tanks are low, pressure drops, or a boil notice is active. A customer's formal complaint posing these questions was acknowledged in writing by the General Manager on August 27, 2026 as a Public Information Act request, with the requested records due within ten business days. This page will be updated when the records arrive.
The federal Safe Drinking Water Act compliance database lists ten violations for this system since 2005, all since returned to compliance. Three are health-based. Several bear directly on this summer's events:
Sources: EPA's SDWIS/ECHO compliance database and the utility's own Consumer Confidence Reports, linked below. The full CCR archive back to 2014 is posted on the PUA's water quality page.
GENERAL MANAGER, MARCH 26, 2026 BOARD MINUTES
PUA PUBLIC STATEMENT, JULY 10, 2025
WTCPUA STAGE 3 ALERT, EFFECTIVE AUGUST 25, 2026
Also worth knowing, per the Bee Cave Mayor's August 2026 public post: the PUA's wholesale sale of water to Rough Hollow ends this winter, when Rough Hollow returns to Lakeway MUD supply, freeing capacity for the rest of the system. The Mayor also confirmed the two Bee Cave appointees to the PUA board deliver a quarterly operations report to Bee Cave City Council, where residents can ask questions during citizen comments.
The PUA is a separate government agency, not part of any city. Its five board seats are appointed by the City of Bee Cave (2), Hays County (2), and Lake Pointe MUD (1). If you live in unincorporated Travis County outside Lake Pointe MUD, you don't vote for any of the bodies that appoint this board. The board meets every other month, on the third Thursday, at Bee Cave City Hall, with time reserved for public comment at every regular meeting.
ROSTER PER WTCPUA.ORG; GM CONTACT SHARED PUBLICLY BY THE BEE CAVE MAYOR, AUGUST 2026
Regular council meetings start at 6:00 PM on the second and fourth Tuesdays. The city's two PUA appointees present an operations update and answer council questions. Residents get up to 3 minutes each in citizen comments (arrive a few minutes early to sign up). The Mayor has publicly invited customers to use this format. Historically, nobody shows up. Show up.
Regular PUA board meetings fall on the third Thursday every other month at 1:00 PM, per the PUA's meetings page. Note the midday start time. Confirm the date and time on the posted agenda (linked below) before you go. Public comment time is reserved at every regular meeting.
Replace the bracketed placeholders with your own details. Editing a sentence or two in your own voice makes every letter count more, since offices discount identical form letters.
Dear Congressman [McCaul / Roy], I'm a constituent in [neighborhood], in unincorporated western Travis County, served by the West Travis County Public Utility Agency (public water system TX2270235, roughly 20,000 connections). On August 26, 2026 our entire system received a boil water notice due to low water pressure, five days after an emergency order to discontinue all irrigation because storage tanks were critically low. This was the fifth boil water event on this system since 2023, including a November 2025 notice caused by treatment plant turbidity exceedances. Families here are boiling drinking water in one of the fastest growing corridors in Texas while the lake supplying us is full. The utility's own board record documents the cause: the treatment plant is capped at 20 million gallons a day and cannot meet peak summer demand, the expansion was delayed by permitting and design complications and is now targeted for December 2027, and in March 2026 the General Manager stated on the record that the Agency "does not have the capacity to serve anyone else until additional water supplies are identified." The Agency has frozen new commercial service applications and is applying for a Texas Water Development Board water supply and infrastructure grant. I'm not asking your office to intervene in a local utility's operations. I'm asking for three things within the federal lane: 1. A constituent inquiry to TCEQ, which holds Safe Drinking Water Act primacy, regarding the pattern of pressure loss and boil water events on PWS TX2270235 and what oversight steps the Commission is taking. 2. Your office's support, where appropriate, for the Agency's pending and future applications for state and federal water infrastructure funding (TWDB programs, SRF, WIFIA), since accelerating the treatment plant expansion is the only durable fix. 3. Awareness in your district office that this is an active constituent issue across the Hamilton Pool Road and Highway 71 corridor. The facts above come from the utility's posted board packets, minutes, and public notices, and I'm glad to provide the documents. Thank you for your service and your attention to this. Respectfully, [Your name] [Your street address and neighborhood] [City], TX [ZIP] [Phone] | [Email]
Dear Commissioner, I'm a resident of [neighborhood], in unincorporated Travis County within Precinct 3, and a retail customer of the West Travis County Public Utility Agency. On August 26, 2026 the PUA issued a systemwide boil water notice due to low water pressure, five days after an emergency order to discontinue all irrigation because storage tanks were critically low. This was the fifth boil water event since 2023. The cause is documented in the PUA's own board record. The treatment plant is capped at 20 million gallons a day and cannot meet peak summer demand. The planned expansion has slipped and is now targeted for December 2027. In March 2026 the General Manager stated the PUA "does not have the capacity to serve anyone else until additional water supplies are identified," and the Agency froze new commercial service applications. In May, the Agency's engineers acknowledged to the board that delivery dates for four capital projects would not be met. The structural problem: the PUA board's five seats are appointed by Bee Cave, Hays County, and Lake Pointe MUD. Unincorporated Travis County customers outside Lake Pointe MUD have no appointing body and no elected official with any formal role in the Agency's governance, despite being among the customers most affected. I'd respectfully ask your office to consider two things: 1. A letter from your office to the WTCPUA board requesting a public update on the expansion schedule, interim reliability measures for the remainder of this summer and for 2027, and distribution to all customers of the written response the Reunion Ranch WCID board requested in May regarding the causes of these incidents. 2. Opening a conversation with the PUA's sponsoring entities about representation for unincorporated Travis County customers. I recognize the county holds no statutory authority over the Agency. I'm asking that the thousands of Precinct 3 households served by this utility have an advocate with standing while the fixes are, by the Agency's own admission, more than a year away. Respectfully, [Your name] [Your street address and neighborhood] [City], TX [ZIP] [Phone] | [Email]
Dear Ms. Riechers and Members of the Board, I'm a retail customer in [neighborhood]. I've read the board packets, so I understand the plant is at its 20 MGD capacity limit, the expansion is targeted for December 2027, and interim supply measures are being pursued. I appreciate that the record is candid. I'm writing with four specific requests: 1. Please include one paragraph of context in each outage and restriction notice, explaining that these events stem from a known capacity constraint with a funded expansion underway. The notices currently arrive with no explanation, and that gap drives most of the public frustration. 2. Please publish the written response to the reliability questions the Reunion Ranch WCID board requested in May (causes, corrective actions, interim measures, and timeline) so all customers can read it, not only the district that asked. 3. The August 27 news release with overnight irrigation data was exactly the kind of transparency customers need. Please make that data snapshot a routine daily publication during restrictions, and publish it by pressure plane or area where possible. Data will change behavior faster than fines, and customers complying with restrictions deserve to know their conservation matters. 4. Please post a current service area map. The map on the website is dated January 2015. Thank you, and thank you to the staff working through these events in the field. Respectfully, [Your name] [Your neighborhood] [Account address or account number, optional]
Seen something neighbors should know about? Tanker trucks filling from hydrants, a main break, pressure readings, watering violations, a notice that doesn't add up. Share it here, with photos if you have them. Everything submitted is reviewed before anything is used, and personal information is always redacted before anything you share is published. Name and contact are optional; leaving a way to reach you helps if we need to confirm a detail.