MEIGS — A government meeting turned into a running argument as Meigs City Council members debated a complaint of improper behavior regarding public works employees repairing a water fixture on private property.

The extent of the city’s water service generally ends at the meter, but last month public works director Leonard Gibson determined that the only way to repair a leak at the Four Corners cotton gin’s West Marshall Street storage facility without impacting the rest of the city was to physically enter the property.

Gibson said he doesn’t understand the controversy, but Council member Tommy White argued that city employees have no business being on private property.

“I’ve got a problem with it, no matter if everybody else does or not,” White said. “It looks to me like the city’s responsibility is to shut the water off, and it’s their responsibility to fix whatever is leaking.”

In White’s view, the city’s existing policy is not to work beyond the meter.

Mayor Cheryl Walters said White is correct in defining the city’s policy, but that exceptions have sometimes been made over the years.

“I think you are asking for a policy that, no matter what, work done by our city public works department stop at the meter regardless,” Walters said.

“I thought that already was the way it was,” White said.

Gibson said the public works department has made similar exceptions before in order to prevent city-wide water outages.

Four Corners had been dealing with a stubborn leak which was leading to pricey water bills, and the cotton company eventually determined that the source of the issue was in a city-owned pipe.

The public works department shut down the property’s water at the request of Council member Edward Eason, also an employee of Four Corners, but when water continued to flow, Gibson figured a larger problem was at hand.

Gibson said he was left with two choices: enter the property to repair the leak, or shut down the entire city water system for eight to nine hours.

“I was helping the city,” the public works director said.

White saw city employees working on private property and took pictures of the event, eventually resulting in a confrontation with Eason.

While adding that he understands that the issue may have affected Meigs as a whole, city attorney Thomas Lehman said public works employees entering private property presents a liability issue.

“Technically, I think you were in the wrong,” he told Gibson. “Practically, you probably did the right thing.”

With a lack of progress in discussing the issue, Walters urged the council to continue to the next item on the agenda.

Meigs’ antiquated water system lacks cut-off valves, and when any pipe two inches or larger has to be repaired the entire city’s water supply has to be shut down.

Compounding the issue is that the public works department knows little about the confusing network of pipes that constitute Meigs’ water system.

“All of these problems boil down to the fact that underneath the City of Meigs, you might as well say is a big ball of spaghetti,” Walters said.

Council member Jimmy Layton’s motion to begin the process of accepting inquiries to upgrade the water system to include cut-off valves was approved unanimously later in the meeting.

Such an upgrade has the potential to prevent a similar incident from occurring in the future, and Walters said issues will likely continue to arise until the system is upgraded.

“It all comes back to our problems with water,” the mayor said.