Options For Community Response To The Safe Drinking Water Act

Small communities violate federal requirements for safe drinking water as much as three times more often than cities. Yet these communities often cannot afford to improve their water service. Safe Water From Every Tap reviews the risks of violating drinking water standards and discusses options for improving water service in small communities. Included are detailed reviews of a wide range of technologies appropriate for treating drinking water in small communities. The book also presents a variety of institutional options for improving the management efficiency and financial stability of water systems.

Discusses the barriers hindering the development & implementation of states' Wellhead Protection (WHP) programs, & the options available to deal with these barriers.

First multi-year cumulation covers six years: 1965-70.

New York City's municipal water supply system provides about 1 billion gallons of drinking water a day to over 8.5 million people in New York City and about 1 million people living in nearby Westchester, Putnam, Ulster, and Orange counties. The combined water supply system includes 19 reservoirs and three controlled lakes with a total storage capacity of approximately 580 billion gallons. The city's Watershed Protection Program is intended to maintain and enhance the high quality of these surface water sources. Review of the New York City Watershed Protection Program assesses the efficacy and future of New York City's watershed management activities. The report identifies program areas that may require future change or action, including continued efforts to address turbidity and responding to changes in reservoir water quality as a result of climate change.

The EPA released the interim final Response Protocol Toolbox: Planning for and Responding to Drinking Water Contamination Threats and Incidents (the Response Protocol Toolbox) in winter of 2003 and spring of 2004 to help the water sector effectively and appropriately plan for and respond to contamination threats and incidents. Since its release, EPA has received feedback and suggestions from several sources concerning improvements in the Response Protocol Toolbox. These Response Guidelines have been developed to provide an easy to use document for field and crisis conditions. While the Response Protocol Toolbox provides detailed information, the Response Guidelines are to be viewed as the application of the same principles during an actual incident. As stated in the definition of Response Guidelines in Module 1, Section 4.3 of the Response Protocol Toolbox, Response Guidelines are different from an Emergency Response Plan in that they are essentially a field guide for responding to contamination threats and can be developed in many different formats. This document is intended to be an action oriented document to assist drinking water utilities, laboratories, emergency responders, state drinking water programs, technical assistance providers, and public health and law enforcement officials during the management of an ongoing contamination threat or incident. The Response Guidelines are derived from the content of the six full modules of the Response Protocol Toolbox. The Response Guidelines are not intended to replace the Response Protocol Toolbox and they do not contain the detailed information contained within the six complete modules. Finally, users are encouraged to adapt the Response Guidelines as necessary to meet their own needs and objectives.