‘Unique situation’: Families anxiously await return of water in Anson County

WADESBORO, N.C. — Families are still without water Wednesday evening despite it flowing again in Anson County, but 9 Investigates found it could take 10 years for the county to recover from its deteriorating water system.

This current issue started last week when a water main leak was reported just outside of Wadesboro.

Tuesday, the water main broke, putting towns in a serious bind. With water running out in a matter of hours and stores running out of supplies, first responders stayed busy handing out bottles of water.

Fast forward to around 4:30 a.m. Wednesday, the town of Peachland said the line was fixed and the tanks were filling up. However, many neighbors were still advised to boil water as the service slowly returns.

But it’s not an instant resolution. So far, the county says they don’t know when running water will be back to all customers.

Channel 9’s Gina Esposito was in Anson County when the governor’s office arrived in Wadesboro. She also heard from neighbors in the area concerned about what Anson County needs to improve its water infrastructure system.

Since our investigation aired last week, the state has committed some financial help to help resolve a Department of Environmental Quality violation. The county decided to raise customers’ water bills to pay for improvements.

Anson County Commissioner Jamie Caudle says the county had hired crews to fix a leak off Highway 74, and the water main blew up before crews could make a permanent fix.

“It’s just a unique situation of where this leak occurred, as to why it affected the entire county,” Caudle said. “The location of this leak ... there are no valves in place that can isolate that leak. So once that leak occurred, all of the water from Wadesboro east was basically just drained out. There was no other way to pump water to the other side of the county.”

9 Investigates learned that there are multiple water leaks throughout Anson County tied to the aging infrastructure. A separate leak off of Highway 74 can’t be turned off due to an old generator. We learned on Wednesday that the DEQ issued the county a violation over that generator. The state put money in its budget to pay for a new one this week.

“That’s one step in the right direction. We have other needs that need to be addressed,” Caudle said. “I think we’ve been put in a bad position, and it takes time to get out of a bad position.”

Caudle just voted to increase water rates by 9% in the county budget, which will help make other infrastructure improvements.

“I just want the citizens to know we are trying to improve the system,” Caudle said. “We got here from decades of no investment into our system, we can’t fix it overnight.”

It’s a reality that some neighbors are coming to terms with.

“Hopefully, somebody federally can help us,” said Peter, a resident in Wadesboro.

Caudle says the county wants to better respond to emergency situations in the future, like figuring out how to tap into other local resources. We reached out to state and federal leaders on Wednesday to see if more help is available to make improvements on the water system, but we’re waiting to hear back.

We also uncovered that Anson County has one of 160 distressed water systems across North Carolina. Some others in our area include Belmont and McAdenville in Gaston County, Albemarle in Stanly County, and East Spencer in Rowan County.

Esposito asked Caudle about other counties dealing with the issues.

“That was the exact conversation we had with the governor’s office—we’re not the only county that needs infrastructure repairs. We’re not the only county with a 60-year-old infrastructure. I’m not going to say we have a model to follow—but there are other counties that are in a similar situation that we can work together and collaborate to get things to improve,” Caudle said.

Caudle says it could take 10 years to replace the county’s filtration plant. The county manager previously told 9 Investigates that a project of that size would cost about $300 million. He said that’s what needs to happen, but they don’t have the funding for it.

©2026 Cox Media Group