SOUTHEAST SPRINGS, Colo. (KOAA) — News 5 first showed you Michelle Gallegos' property in May after a water main break on Murray Boulevard and Airport Road left mud and debris along her property. Five months later, it happened again.
"Just destroyed my yard again," Gallegos said.
It's not only Gallegos dealing with the aftermath. Her neighbors are also cleaning up the damage themselves.
"Last time they didn't do anything. They told us it wasn't their problem," Jarid Gatchel said.
"They didn't see it as a big problem. They didn't see it as an issue," Ricardo Delgado said.
Utilities records show five breaks within a block of Murray Boulevard and Airport Road since 2013 — in 2013, 2014, 2020 and 2026 — with corrosion identified as the primary cause.
Colorado Springs Utilities says it has taken steps to address the issue.
"We did proactively replace around 100 ft of the steel water main. We replaced it with PVC pipe, which is a more reliable and durable pipe to try to mitigate this from happening in the future," Cassie Melvin, with CSU public affairs, said.
Utilities has also identified both water mains on Airport Road for replacement within the next three years.
But Gallegos and her neighbors have been asking for one thing: a retaining wall.
"They could put up a retaining wall," Gallegos said.
"I wish they would make it maybe build a retaining wall, help divert this from ever happening again," Gatchel said.
So I reached out to their council member, Kimberly Gold, to see if she would meet with the neighbors and see the damage firsthand. She agreed.
Gold walked the neighborhood with some of the neighbors, looking at the damage.
"I knew very little, honestly. Actually seeing it with your own eyes that that brings a different level of accountability to wanting to see a solution," Gold said.
Gold says she took the neighbors' concerns, including their request for a retaining wall, directly to Colorado Springs Utilities' CEO.
"I do have to be a little vague and what I can share because we don't want to overpromise and underdeliver, right? But the CEO has said that he will make this a priority, and that there are possible solutions that involve multiple partners that can make for a greater long term solution, so I'm going to hang on to hopefulness of that and keep in contact with him so that we can get a truly viable solution for our neighbors," Gold said.
For Gallegos replacing the pipe is a start, but it doesn't answer whether my home will be protected the next time a break happens.
"It's hard to have trust in something when it happens twice in five months," Gallegos said.
"We're hoping that we can build that trust back with them just knowing that we wanna do the right thing," Melvin said.
We Will reach out to Utilities in the coming days to ask for any updates.
