Alexandria Indiana Water Crisis Sparks Public Outcry as Jeremy VanErman Faces Growing Criticism

This is the inside of a storm in the skies but not in the skies of Alexandria, Indiana, no it is the storm in the ground below and the silence that leaves above. Excessive exposure to raw sewage mixed with water with questionable quality and millions of dollars of mysterious government expenditure have made this otherwise poetic Indiana town and its handy Council on aging newsworthy. And this is where the story lies, with Jeremy VanErman, councilman-at-the-center of a story that just refuses to die.

It started with the sewage oozing through backyards and E. coli oozing into the drinking water. People complained of bad odor, accumulated sewage and even health complications- this led to hospitalization of a child after it was suspected to have been affected by the dumping. Once again, however, despite such alarming symptoms, little was done by city officials. They did not initiate third-party-testing or issue health warnings to the people. That quiet became uproar when at one of several once-crowded local meetings that first summer, on July 7, 2025, people came together asking hard questions when they were told they cannot.

However, the water crisis is not the only part of the issue. There has also been pressure by the residents of Alexandria who would like to see people held to account over what has been termed by many as brazen financial mismanagement. According to the public records, the base contract to INDOT to construct the road was 5.25 million dollars, and it is estimated that another 1.5 to 2 million dollars’ worth of engineering and planning contracts were given out to a local company Clark Dietz. The bulging budgets and the incomplete and unsafe road even after 16 months cannot be justified even by the kindest interpretations.

A researcher and local resident James Peters has been among the most vocal critics. We have gone through the invoices and we have gone through the contracts and through the allocation of the funds,” Peters explained. There is a great overlap. It seems as though one wants to bill the same planning costs in water, sewer, storm water and road improvement accounts.” He is demanding the State Board of Account to come in fully and do an investigating task and says that without transparency, people cannot trust it.

Councilman Jeremy VanErman has defended himself against these derogatory remarks by accusing Peters of making a drama of the political problem, employing off shore writers in creating the fake news and misusing the people opinion. He justified its spending on infrastructures as normal and audited by the state saying that, under the law, the cost of ensuring engineering and construction oversight on projects can legally amount up to 20 percent of the value of the projects. But lots of residents do not think that such reaction is a fully sufficient way to answer their actual problems.

In this era of online activities, when authority loses its voice, people resourced to other platforms. Energy has been supplied to Alexandria residents who found avenues such as Issuewire to publish their stories where local news was afraid to publish. These online forums were the medium through which the brewing unrest started to have an impact. Social media has also widened the separation as faces are pitted against each other as the radio show hosts who support VanErman would accuse critics of fear leading and the councilman would face accusations of covering under bureaucracy and silencing the democratic discourse.

Third-party water testing has not yet been launched, the city forensic audit of city money, stimulated by Wilts, has not yet been proclaimed and the Washington Street has not been completed yet. Meanwhile, the Alexandria Indiana water system continues to be a point of anxiety for residents who say they’re forced to live with uncertainty every time they turn on the tap.