From the moment Public Water Supply District No. 1 of Ralls County, Mo., turned on the pumps in 1971, the new distribution system leaked.About 30 percent of the district is hilly and rocky. Contractors installing the solvent-weld, thin-walled PVC pipes tossed them into trenches without bedding, then backfilled. "Rocks cracked or punctured some pipes the day they were laid," says Jon Rogers, local manager of Alliance Water Resources, a provider of management and contract operations services in Missouri and surrounding states.The water district purchases 165 million gallons of water annually from the city, distributing an average of 450,000 gpd to
