![\"Family](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/87tsa7ef17ikwf6w.jpg\")
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LOS ANGELES – Joshua Ward’s family has lived on the same property for two generations. Their average water bill during last year’s heat was, at most, about $1,400.<\/p>\n
This year, with record heat, his water bill has been between $600 and $850.<\/p>\n
$10,000 water bill <\/p>\n
So you can imagine his surprise when he got a $10,000 water bill early this year for the usage at his property during the winter, when his water use is the lowest.<\/p>\n
He figures the excessive amount is the result of repairs to a water hydrant down the street from his property.<\/p>\n
Social media posts show it was sheared and badly damaged last November.<\/p>\n
Neighbors confirm the water was off for repairs a couple of times because not only was the hydrant repaired, but it was moved up the street.<\/p>\n
Ward says that when they were told they had their water back, all the faucets and hoses at his property were blowing “more air than water” for a while.<\/p>\n
He explains that flushing the pipes right after repairs is common and necessary, but he believes that maybe it wasn’t done properly.<\/p>\n
“Air has more volume than water,” the plumber explains, so if that is what’s going through your system, the meter moves rapidly, much more than it would with water.<\/p>\n
The bill he got would translate into thousands of gallons of water leaked over two months \u2014 enough to fill a pool and more \u2014 which he would have noticed, he adds.<\/p>\n
He says DWP has come out and looked at his meter, saying only that it is working properly and that it could have been a leak.<\/p>\n
“A mysterious leak that happened right after their repair and suddenly disappeared without anyone fixing it?” asks Ward.<\/p>\n
His property is on the highest part of the hillside, off Sunland and Wornom avenues. Other neighbors say they got increases, but nothing like his.<\/p>\n
Ward believes that’s because his is on top of the hill: “Turn a water bottle upside down, and you’ll see the \u2018siphoning\u2019 effect, where air goes to the top.”<\/p>\n
He believes that’s what may have happened. “Either that, or there’s a pool hidden somewhere!”<\/p>\n
DWP responded to FOX 11 inquiries on the matter, explaining that they do want to look into this. We’ll keep you updated.<\/p>\n
The Source: FOX 11 spoke with Joshua Ward, reviewed social media posts and interviewed neighbors about the hydrant repairs. DWP responded to FOX 11\u2019s inquiries about Ward\u2019s water bill.<\/p>\n
Los Angeles<\/a>Environment<\/a> <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"LOS ANGELES – Joshua Ward’s family has lived on the same property for two generations. Their average water…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":503078,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[1184,643,48,52,51,47,137,50,49,100,1181],"class_list":["post-503077","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-los-angeles","tag-ca","tag-environment","tag-la","tag-la-headlines","tag-la-news","tag-los-angeles","tag-los-angeles-county","tag-los-angeles-headlines","tag-los-angeles-news","tag-news","tag-us"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/503077","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=503077"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/503077\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/503078"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=503077"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=503077"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=503077"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}