Houston officials say state made the call on water boil notice

Isaiah Chirip helps push a pallet of bottled water during a water distribution and free flu vaccination event Monday at the Holman Street Baptist Church in Houston. (Credit: Mark Felix for The Texas Tribune)

Houston officials weren’t convinced that a brief power outage at a water treatment plant created the kind of risk that warranted a day-and-a-half-long boil-water notice but were overruled by state regulators, city officials said Tuesday.

Nearly all of the city’s 2.2 million water customers were under a boil-water notice for more than 36 hours after two transformers at Houston’s East Water Purification Plant went offline at about 10:30 a.m. Sunday.