Posted January 21, 2026
Consolidated is working with mutual aid partners, utility providers and emergency services to mitigate service interruptions due to severe weather. For the January 24 – 27 winter weather, we anticipate increased call volumes, reduced system pressures and increased technician response times due to hazardous road conditions. Please consider taking precautionary measures to protect plumbing.
Before the hard freeze
- Locate your meter and isolation valves so you know how to shut your water off in the case of a leak.
- Keep the lid on your meter box closed to protect the meter from freezing conditions.
- Protect plumbing by insulating pipes in attics, garages, and under pier and beam homes.
- Disconnect and drain outdoor hoses. Shutoff and drain water to unused exterior faucets, if possible. Otherwise, insulate the faucet or any above-ground fixtures. Insulating your meter box with old towels, feed sacks, etc. is permitted, but you must remove the insulation as soon as freezing conditions pass to avoid meter damage and interference with meter communication.
- Unoccupied meters/properties: Consider shutting off at the meter and draining the water lines of vacant houses, churches or deer leases.
During the hard freeze, open cabinet doors under sinks to allow warm air to circulate around plumbing. If hard freeze conditions are expected, consider dripping interior faucets. The rate of flow needed to prevent bursting will depend on your plumbing type, pipe location and weather severity. If possible, monitor your plumbing routinely during the hard-freeze event.
When safe to do so, check the meters of elderly neighbors and unoccupied properties for leaks (deer leases, pastures, vacation rentals, churches, etc.). Leaks at churches and vacant meters were the primary source of outages for Consolidated members during Winter Storm Uri.
Outage Reporting: During severe weather, system pressures may be reduced proactively to conserve water or inadvertently due to increased customer demand from running faucets, customer leaks, or system leaks.
If you experience a water outage,
- Check your meter. If the red dial is spinning clockwise when all fixtures are off, there’s a leak on your side.
- Check individual fixtures of your home to determine if a section of your plumbing has frozen.
- Check with neighbors to see if the problem is isolated to your plumbing.
- If the problem is not on your side of the meter, call the main office at 936-544-2986 to report an outage. This number is monitored 24/7 by system staff or an after-hours answering service.
After the thaw, inspect your plumbing for leaks - even if you did not experience an outage. Failure to find and isolate leaks can cause localized water outages, property damage and very high water bills.
If our primary phone system is affected by severe weather, we will update our website with a back-up communication method and relevant news as it becomes available. Safe drinking water rules require that we issue precautionary boil water notices under certain conditions, including system outages and very low system pressures. Sign up for these email or text alerts by going to www.consolidatedwsc.com and clicking on the red “Sign Up for Alerts” button on the right-hand side of the page.
Posted October 09, 2025:
In response to inquiries stemming from incorrect statements on social media, we want to clarify a few facts regarding Consolidated Water Supply Corporation (Consolidated WSC) and our relationship with other local water providers.
Consolidated WSC is not the same entity as Houston County Water Control and Improvement District No. 1 (HC WCID 1) and does not sell water to the City of Crockett. In fact, Consolidated WSC purchases water from the City of Crockett at our headquarters on the Loop. We also maintain an interconnect that allows us to purchase bulk water from the City of Crockett under emergency conditions.
Although we would welcome the opportunity to collaborate more closely in the future, Consolidated WSC does not have the infrastructure in place to provide water to the City of Crockett. And just to be clear, Consolidated WSC is not being acquired by the City of Crockett, either (or by anyone else, for that matter).
Like Crockett, Consolidated WSC purchases surface water from Houston County WCID 1 as a supplemental source for some of our pressure planes. Consolidated WSC and the City of Crockett are the two primary customers of HC WCID 1. Our three entities often work together during severe weather events or unexpected system failures to reroute water where needed and prevent or minimize service interruptions. We value this ability to provide diversified water sources and system redundancy through strong local partnerships.
We recognize that rural water management and interagency coordination are complex, and we believe that successful regional planning depends on cooperation, transparency, and mutual aid. Consolidated WSC considers both the City of Crockett and Houston County WCID 1 to be trusted partners in providing safe, reliable water to the community.
As conversations continue about large-scale water transfers and growing pressure on East Texas water supplies, we encourage our community to focus our collective energy on protecting local resources through constructive, solutions-oriented dialogue. We will do our part to enable productive discussions and are happy to answer questions or explain how these systems work together to serve the community.
Please feel free to attend a board meeting or schedule a one-on-one visit with management to learn more.
Sincerely,
Amber Stelly
The Consolidated Water Supply Corporation, General Manager
Posted August 11, 2025:
Amber Stelly, General Manager of The Consolidated Water Supply Corporation (CWSC), has been appointed as Texas’ next representative to the National Rural Water Association’s Board of Directors. Her selection reflects not only individual leadership, but also the dedication and expertise of the entire Consolidated WSC team, recognized as one of the most resilient and respected rural water supply corporations in Texas.
CWSC serves more than 16,000 people and maintains over 860 miles of distribution pipe – three times the state average for water supply corporations. Governed by a board of nine volunteer directors, CWSC benefits from leadership that reflects the diverse skills and interests of its membership. The entire team is regarded as industry experts, frequently called upon for benchmarking, public testimony, and mutual aid. Their work has earned statewide recognition in the categories of Large System Excellence and Individual Excellence in Operations.
When Amber assumed leadership in 2017, CWSC was struggling with chronic net income deficits and long-overdue maintenance on aging infrastructure. Over the past eight years, the corporation has increased capital assets by 71%, significantly expanded cash reserves more than tenfold, and modernized mapping, dispatch, and database management systems for the first time in decades. While challenges remain, the organization is well-positioned to build upon these service and reliability improvements.
A lifelong learner, Amber holds a B.S. in Molecular and Cell Biology from Texas A&M University, an M.S. in Industrial Engineering, and is a doctoral candidate in Business Administration with a research focus on AI-driven pipe failure risk modeling in rural water networks. A devoted mother of two and wife of a U.S. Air Force veteran, she has dedicated years to community service through volunteer firefighting, parent-teacher organization leadership, and active participation in local government. At CWSC, she has championed family-focused initiatives such as a free children’s library, expanded family healthcare support, youth outreach and agricultural sponsorships, and an annual Trunk-R-Treat event for local families.
Amber considers her work a calling to serve her neighbors through a resource essential to life, public health, and economic prosperity. Guided by her Christian values and grounded in servant leadership, she advocates fiercely for rural communities. Her recent testimony at the Texas Capitol in support of individual property rights and sustainable groundwater management reflects this commitment. In her national role, she will continue to protect rural Texans from adverse legislation while advocating for programs that strengthen the infrastructure we depend on.
