The water stinks and tastes bad. Nearly a year later, why hasn’t NC town fixed it?

Julie Yawn has been brewing her sweet tea the exact same way since her cozy breakfast restaurant, Chat-N-Nibble, opened in Kings Mountain 22 years ago:

One pouch of Luzianne tea, 3 gallons of water and 6 cups of sugar.

It’s a staple among her loyal regulars in a community — about 30 miles west of Charlotte — that’s serious about its sweet tea. But early last summer she began getting questions she’d never heard before.

“What have you done to the tea?” customers would ask her. “It tastes terrible. It tastes like swamp water.”

Soon, she realized she wasn’t the only restaurant in the town of nearly 12,000 getting complaints about an earthy taste in their tea and fountain drinks. And daily posts in community Facebook groups signaled the taste and odor problem wasn’t isolated to businesses, but permeating people’s homes.

Something was happening with the city’s water. But nearly a year later, Yawn and many others across Kings Mountain are still searching for answers.

Last summer, Kings Mountain leaders said an increase in organic material in Moss Lake — the city’s water source — was behind persistent taste and odor problems. City officials pledged to fix it. But nearly a year later, many residents still face water problems, and they say they still don’t fully understand what caused the issue, what the city is doing to solve it, whether a permanent fix exists — and whether they can trust assurances that the water is safe.

The City of Kings Mountain answered Observer questions in writing but would not make City Manager Todd Carpenter or Water Resources director William Nash available for an interview for this story. Since last summer, the city has maintained that despite the poor taste and odor that the water is safe and in compliance with Environmental Protection Agency standards.

But residents say the issue’s persistence has hurt businesses and sparked anxiety. Over the last year, Yawn says she saw her loyal customer base drop by close to 25%. Many residents rely on bottled water to drink, cook and even brush their teeth.

During lunchtime on a recent February day Yawn looked out into her unusually empty dining room. Tables lined with blue picnic tablecloths sat idle.

For two decades she’s poured endless effort into this place and takes pride in what it has become. But the water issues are embarrassing, she said.

“I don’t know how many things (I’ve seen) on Facebook in our little area, people saying they won’t eat in Kings Mountain anymore because of the water situation,” she said. “... People are saying, ‘I’ll go to Shelby, I’ll go to Gastonia, but I’m not eating at Kings Mountain because they can’t straighten their water out.’”

What’s wrong with the water?

The Charlotte Observer spoke to several Kings Mountain residents and received dozens of messages online about the city’s water. The residents’ description of the taste and smell ranged from an earthy, almost dirt-like flavor to that of chemicals like Clorox Clean Up. It’s something even Congressman Tim Moore, who was born, raised and still lives in the small town, noticed in his own home.

“It just tasted like a dirt taste at one time when it was really bad,” Moore said.

In a written response to the Observer, Jeni Bukolt, a communication representative for the city, explained that the bad taste and odor are caused by an increase of algae blooms called MIB and geosmin in Moss Lake. Bukolt did not explain what caused the increase, but said the algae levels in the lake have been growing over time.

Moss Lake is a surface water source which is directly impacted by environmental conditions such as rainfall, drought, runoff from surrounding land, nutrient levels and seasonal lake turnover. These factors can prompt algae growth and make their impact on taste and odor more noticeable, Bukolt wrote.

To address these challenges, the city says it’s adjusting aspects of its water treatment system such as carbon treatment, cleaning storage tanks, and flushing parts of the system. In addition, the city allocated $200,000 in November to install something called baffle walls into the water system.

Baffle walls slow the flow of water coming into the treatment plant and allow solids like MIB and geosmin to settle before entering the plant for easier treatment, Carpenter explained during a July 22, 2025, council meeting.

The Charlotte Observer asked the N.C. Department of Environmental Quality for any records in regard to its testing of the water and rates of MIB and geosmin found in it. Josh Kastrinsky, deputy spokesperson for the agency, said it had not been collecting water samples and directed the Observer to the city.

Questions surround dredging and promised upgrades

The Charlotte Observer analyzed months of City Council meetings and found missed timelines for a key water system upgrade, admissions about decisions that affected lake conditions and a communication strategy still in development nearly a year after problems surfaced.

In a June 24 City Council meeting, Carpenter said he hoped baffle walls would be installed into the water system by September. Initial plans were submitted to the North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality in May. But Kings Mountain did not allocate funds toward their construction until late November.

Bukolt said baffle walls are a “significant infrastructure improvement” that will take time. When asked when the city expected the baffle walls to be installed, Bukolt did not give a date. But she said construction could not be completed until treatment basins underwent cleaning, which is underway.

While the baffle walls will be a significant improvement, Bukolt said they cannot guarantee good-tasting water.

“Because our drinking water comes from a natural surface water source — Moss Lake — there will likely always be periods when taste and odor change due to environmental conditions,” Bukolt wrote to the Observer.

In May 2025, around the time many residents say they started to notice changes with the water, dredging was completed in the northern end of Moss Lake. City Manager Carpenter told City Council members that he personally approved the dredging because it was promised to a resident before his tenure and admitted that it had an impact on the taste and odor.

“At the time I did not understand the impact dredging could have on the organics,” he said during the July 22 council meeting. In the same meeting he admitted that he believed the dredging “had an impact” on water conditions.

In a written statement to the Observer, Bukolt said that the dredging has since been determined to not be a primary cause of the taste and odor issue, but did not explain the discrepancy in Carpenter’s comments from July. But all future dredging projects remain on hold out of caution.

On Jan. 15, the City of Kings Mountain received a notice of deficiency from the Department of Environmental Quality which found excessive sludge in one of the water treatment basins. The inspector noted that the excessive sludge could affect the water treatment process. The letter required the city bring the basins into compliance 30 days from the written notice. If not, the city must provide quarterly updates to the agency.

Since the notice, a spokesman said the city has cleared two sedimentation bins of sludge and expects to have all the sludge cleared by April 10.

Since last year, Bukolt said, the city has maintained communications about the water system outside of City Council meetings through social media posts, media releases and video updates from the city manager.

But it won’t be until next month, nearly a year after the problems began, that the city will unveil an in-depth communication plan. According to Bukolt, this plan will address frequently asked questions, water system explanations, and supporting visuals to help address questions around taste, odor, infrastructure, and next steps.

A community forum that was canceled in January is being rescheduled in March.

The cost of uncertainty

Tony Goings has never seen the water this bad.

“It just smells like something is wrong,” the Kings Mountain native said. “That’s the best way, the most descriptive way for someone who hasn’t smelled it. It just smells like something’s wrong.”

Since last July, Goings has used only bottled water to drink and cook. And when going out to eat downtown, he brings his own drinks.

Goings feels like the city has acknowledged the problem. He’s seen their social media posts and received letters in the mail. But what he hasn’t felt like he’s seen is action. Nor does he trust that the water is truly safe, as the city claims.

“It’s almost like going to a dentist because you got a toothache, and then the dentist says, ‘Yeah, you have a cavity.’ He just tells you (that) you have a cavity. He doesn’t fill the cavity. He doesn’t address the cavity,” he said. “... Telling us we have a problem is obvious. We know it’s a problem. The fact that you haven’t fixed it after telling us? What is that all about?”

At Sub Factory, one of Kings Mountain’s handful of mom-and-pop restaurants, Rachel Littlejohn takes orders near a homemade sign.

Tea brewed WITHOUT KM city water

The sign was a necessary measure after the restaurant saw its drink sale revenue decline at the height of the city’s water issues.

In the back, near the restaurant’s fountain drink machine, sit two empty five gallon jugs that her team has filled each week to avoid using city water. The restaurant is now essentially paying two water bills, Littlejohn said. One to fill up the jugs and another for the water they don’t use.

Littlejohn said she’s seen the water quality improve with recent cooler weather. But she doesn’t have confidence it’ll stay that way.

“As a business, you rely on consistency,” she said. “So if it’s consistently not tasting good, the people live here. They know if it tastes good every day or not. So if they were just at home last week, and it didn’t taste good last week, then they’re not going to want to buy your tea.”

Congressman Moore said he recently met with city officials and has confidence in the water’s safety. But when asked if he had confidence that the city had a long-term solution, he couldn’t say with certainty.

“I don’t know. They seemed to feel good about it. But I can’t say that they did that iron clad,” he said.

He said that it bothers him to know that businesses are seeing an impact. While he believes that the water is safe to drink, he understands residents’ hesitancy.

“I do feel like it’s safe, but that’s not the only part of it,” he said. “It ought to taste good and not have a smell.”

Every day, longtime Chat-N-Nibble server Doni “Cookie” Coke gets questions about the water from customers to the point of frustration.

She gives her best shot at an explanation, but feels the embarrassment creep through her as she leaves tables and hears customers talking about it behind her.

Not only is the restaurant left without compensation for water it can’t use, and extra money spent on bottled waters and sodas, but she’s left ill-equipped to tell customers what is going on, she said.

“What exactly is wrong with the water? You tell me,” she said.