State officials with the Virginia Department of Health (VDH) have raised concerns about Richmond’s water system for the third time this year, issuing another Notice of Alleged Violation to the city Monday over the May boil water advisory.

The notice cites operational issues that officials believe contributed to the incident, which affected water service in several neighborhoods. It also lists alleged regulatory violations related to oversight, maintenance and water pressure at the Richmond water treatment plant.

VDH determined the violations partly through the explanation provided by Mayor Danny Avula and Richmond Department of Public Utilities (DPU) Director Scott Morris for the advisory, which pointed to delayed maintenance of plant equipment and poor raw water quality.

While the notice acknowledged the work done to improve Richmond’s water system operations, state officials warned that “more work is clearly needed,” given the frequency of incidents and the repeated alleged violations they’ve observed.

The notice states that the violations “represent unprecedented and very concerning situations for a waterworks this size and service area. These events erode public trust in the city’s ability to comply with applicable regulations that protect public health.”

In a statement acknowledging the notice was received, DPU officials noted their work to strengthen various plant procedures and said they “will continue to evaluate further enhancements.”

“The city remains committed to working with VDH and regional partners to ensure it meets its mission to deliver safe and clean drinking water to the region,” DPU officials said.

The notice is the latest issued to Richmond since an outage at the plant in early January left the Metro Richmond region without running water for days. The notice also follows an agreement by the city and VDH to an Order of Consent focused on the water crisis last week.

The order includes a $6,817 fine for regulatory violations found at the plant, a summary of events before and during the crisis, and a list of corrective actions taken by DPU and other city officials so far.

“The water crisis was avoidable, preventable and should not have happened,” the consent order states. “Poor and improper operational decisions over many years caused or contributed to the water crisis, which resulted in DPU normalizing and accepting conditions that should not have been accepted.”

Along with the fine, the city and VDH have agreed to a corrective action plan to address deficiencies at the plant.

“We’re taking the recommendations made by our independent investigators at HNTB and those from the Virginia Department of Health seriously, and we’ve already checked a large number of items off the list,” Avula said in a statement. The city retained infrastructure development firm HNTB Corp. in January to develop a report on the circumstances surrounding the city’s water service disruption.

“There’s a lot of work ahead of us, but I know that, together with our partners, we can build a more resilient water system that our region deserves.”