The Center for Rural Pennsylvania just released a new report entitled, “Rural Pennsylvania’s Water and Wastewater Infrastructure,” by Penn State’s Dr. Beverly A. Cigler analyzing the capacity of rural communities to meet their water and wastewater needs.

Citizens sometimes take for granted the running water and efficient wastewater systems that are critical to their communities. Until problems arise, water and wastewater systems may be easy to ignore. Like all communities statewide, Pennsylvania’s small, rural communities rely on the continuous health of their water and wastewater systems to maintain the quality of life that their residents have come to expect.

Agricultural and residential waste, industrial discharges, construction runoff, and changing regulatory and financial environments can threaten water and wastewater systems. In some cases, water and wastewater infrastructure needs require immediate repair or replacement due to age, condition, capacity, safety, or permitting.

If such needs are ignored, more infrastructure will reach the end of its useful life, and rural communities will ultimately bear the cost of repair or replacement. Infrastructure shortcomings can threaten system viability, hinder development, negatively impact public safety, and adversely affect quality of life.

This study, which was conducted from 2002 to 2004, examined the system capacity of a sample of Pennsylvania’s small water and wastewater systems to assess their ability to meet challenges to their systems.

System capacity includes the technical, managerial, and financial ability to achieve, maintain, and plan for compliance with applicable standards, given the available resources and characteristics of a system’s service population.

Results from the study offer much needed baseline data that may help lay a foundation for actions needed to meet funding challenges and to enhance the infrastructure needs of rural water and wastewater systems over the coming decades.

The following considerations were developed from the study’s findings:

· Enhance water and wastewater operators’ managerial, technical and financial skills to reduce the need for infrastructure funding;

· Encourage further cooperation in planning for future needs among local governments, state and federal regulatory agencies, funding agencies and legislators;

· Collect systematic information on community infrastructure systems;

· Enhance coordination among agencies for program information, which would include funding access to allow communities to better address future needs;

· Devote more attention to evaluating and possibly integrating technical training opportunities for plant operators;

· Consider alternative strategies for communities of various sizes to develop capacity-building activities, especially financial capacity;

· Provide capital improvement planning assistance to communities of all sizes; and

· Encourage citizen participation in water conservation and provide information on the growing needs of water and wastewater systems and the options for reducing costs and financing in water and wastewater to help reduce the demand for infrastructure.

Copies of Rural Pennsylvania’s Water and Wastewater Infrastructure are available online.

The Center for Rural Pennsylvania is a bipartisan, bicameral legislative agency that serves as a resource for rural policy within the General Assembly. The Center Board is currently chaired by Sen. John Gordner (R-Columbia).

7/28/2006