For the second time in two months, the Coweta County Board of Commissioners listened to another tale of water woes for some of the county's residents.

Commission chairman Jim McGuffey said he had heard complaints from residents in the Aspen Woods Lake area about the poor quality of their privately-operated water system.

In fact, a recent legal advertisement showed the water system with an unacceptably high level of coliform bacteria.

"It's absolutely ridiculous. It's time for us to do something," McGuffey said.

The county is currently involved in a legal battle to take over another privately-owned water system in the Newnan Pines subdivision that has come under scrutiny for poor water quality.

Commissioner Lawrence Nelms suggested the county look at some sort of legal action in the latest case and force the residents to take county water.

But Commissioner Vernon "Mutt" Hunter suggested an alternative route. Instead of pursuing costly legal action that could take months to resolve, Hunter said the county should go in competition with the private systems and build parallel lines next to the private water lines.

"Let's put them out of business," Hunter said.

If a court ruled the county could take over the system, Hunter said it would not meet the county standards and the county would have to spend thousands to get the system up to producing clean and adequate water.