The Turley Water Department … to goes back to 1925. The minutes of the meeting of the board are still in the department office. Eighty-two years of records.

The Turley Water Department is was established by the hard work of just three residents of the town.
O.O. Brannon; L. J. Garnett; C. Rankin.

They spent their own money in getting the required resolution made up and presenting it to the Board of Commissioners of the County of Tulsa. It was approved by that Board of Commissioners and the guidelines were outlined and declared a water district. It was incorporated as Water Improvement District No.3, (a non-profit organization). That was in 1925. The guidelines fall under the Oklahoma Rural Water Association, (ORWA).

A bond was voted in by Tulsa County to pay for the initial expense. It eventually became known to the general community that water would soon become available to them. Of course, at that time, Turley covered quite a large area. The city limits of Tulsa was at Mohawk Boulevard and North Peoria. That was a good four miles from Turley proper. Just to hook to Tulsa’s water required a lot of pipe laying.

On 27 August 1927, Two years after the approval of the Commissioners … the laying of lines was completed and the department began its operation. Working out of the O. O. Brannon General Store with board members, O.O. Brannon, Chairman and office manager; L. J. Garnett, Secretary; C. Rankin, member and meter reader. Before the year was over there were 32 customers hooked up

The bond money played out in 1928, and the Water Department now had to look to maintaining what had already been established depending strictly upon money that was generated from the customers.

Today there are several misconceptions about the water department. From time to time people are heard to say that they paid for the tap … or … they paid for the meter … and that it belongs to them. The water taps and the meters were never purchased by the land owners. The water taps and meters have always been, and still are, property of the Department. The department is responsible for the purchase and the maintenance of the taps and meters. And also responsible for purchase of water pipes and connections.

The Minutes reveal that the first three board members worked for 16 years without pay. In those early years, no bills were sent out by mail, but each customer was required to come to the office and pay their water bill once a month located in the O. O. Brannon store.

18 October 1941, the 3 board members, having worked for 16 years without pay, presented a petition for approval for a change in board members to the County Commissioner. The following five board members presented on the petition were approved:
Walter Barber; J. E. Turner; R. G. Brink; K. Vincent; Jerry Ledbetter. And the first paid employ, Ethel Grimes was hired. She was the Office Manager, Meter Reader, and supervisor of maintenance of lines until she resigned in June 1943.

In June 1943, new board members appointed were: J. M. Hill, Chairman; Charlie M. Murphree, Office Manager; L. S. Robison, Member. Neva Robison was hired as Assistant Office Manager.

30 May 1944, there were 489 customers.

30 September 1949 - the district was servicing 867 meters.

25 April 1951 - the district was servicing 1026 meters.

The department operated out of several different places of business over the years. But on 25 April 1951 - a piece of property located in the 6100 block of North Peoria was purchased from Dave Lewis for the purpose of a permanent Water Office. Work was started by Mr. E. H. Wilkinson to erect the building.
5 July 1951, the construction was completed and moved into new building located at 6108 North Peoria. That is it’s present day location

On 12 July 1954 - Due to annexation, the master meter located at North Peoria and Mohawk Boulevard was moved to 46th Street North. All residents South of 46th Street and Fairhill Addition north of 46th Street were to be on Tulsa Line. WID#3 lost a lot of customers but were branching out west.

July 1955 - Began to laying PVC pipe. From now on will be using PVC to replace the steel pipe.

25 April 1961 - It was approved to order an address-o-graph machine to print out the bills and begin mailing them out.

Today, the Turley Water Improvement District #3, serves a little over 1000 customers.

It is estimated that about 70% of the lines in the district are quite old. We are talking about the steel pipe lines. It is only in the last few years that we have been repairing lines with PVC. If we could expose all the lines we would see that over the last 80 years that repairs are only patch work. We have installed new lines on 60th Street North from peoria up to Johnstown. When weather permits we will be installing a new line on 72nd Street North from Peoria to Victor.

There are now 78 fire hydrants installed in the district. These are also purchased and maintained by the department.

Today … one of the biggest problem that faces the department is ‘water theft’. Water Theft falls into two categories:
(1) Customers (usually renters),jumping the meter. This is done when the meter has been pulled because of non-payment of their bill. (2) Customers (usually renters), moving out of area owing a bill. Moving out owing a bill has become most prevalent and is hurting the department the most because 75% of our customers are renters.

You may say: “But that is what the deposits are for.”
But when there is a water line break on the landowner’s side … the bill can run up to close to $500, depending the size of line.

The Water Department is urging you to help us with these problems. After all, as the costs of providing water for you goes up, so does your water rates.