MILTON, Pa. — Water levels in the reservoirs and rivers are extremely low in Northumberland County due to the lack of rain and warm weather. Because of this, Pennsylvania American Water is asking homes and businesses in Northumberland County to reduce water use by 10%. At the Beautiful Addiction Salon in Milton, stylists will start offering dry haircuts.
"That'll help with people that just wanna get in and out pretty quick, and that's also going to help with that conservation of that water. We're also going to be looking at doing larger loads of laundry and trying to only do that every other day," said Kathryn Angle, Beautiful Addiction Stylist.
Kathryn Angle, a stylist at the Beautiful Addiction Salon, says they shampoo up to five customers a day. Water is also used when coloring hair.
"But that main shampoo is going to be after that color is processed and is ready to be washed off. Sometimes you have a double process, and you need to do it twice if you have a bleach and then you're putting color on top, sometimes you do gotta do it twice, we try to avoid it just for the sake of you know our time, our client time, and water as well," said Angle.
At Marlin's Fine Food in Milton, staff say they have been conserving water long before the drought watch.
"We fill our sink to wash our dishes, wash a full load, rinse them, and then let it out. We don't let water run at home. I know we don't have a dishwasher here other than our hands," said Cindy Morton-Beck, owner of Marlin's Fine Food.
Besides cooking, staff at the restaurant also use water for sanitation purposes.
"We have a bucket full of Clorox water, and you know our cloths go in there, get rinsed out, get rung out, and used, so we're not running water every time we want to get them wet and bleach and whatnot," said Morton-Beck.
PA American Water says there are other ways to conserve water, such as checking pipes for leaks, using water-efficient appliances, and setting up a rain barrel to repurpose rain when it does fall.