Drinking Water

Meeting federal drinking water standards is a major financial problem for about 50,000 small towns that account for 90 percent of the nation's drinking water. In 1986, Congress amended the Safe Drinking Water Act to increase the number of regulated contaminants and beef up the Environmental Protection Agency's (EPA) enforcement authority. EPA has since issued new regulations that have significantly increased the responsibilities involved in managing drinking water programs. States are experimenting with a variety of strategies to improve small water systems' compliance with the Safe Drinking Water Act. They are (1) exploring affordable, alternative treatment strategies; (2) testing creative ways to deliver technical and financial help to small systems; and (3) exploring options for restructuring small systems, such as consolidating nonviable small systems with viable ones. A number of barriers, however, are preventing the wider use of these strategies--particularly the sheer number of systems needing assistance. EPA needs to strengthen its efforts to help small communities use more cost-effective technologies to protect drinking water. Moreover, Congress and the administration need to examine the spiraling costs associated with the act's requirements. The addition of new requirements without a commensurate increase in resources has hobbled states' and communities' ability to comply with basic program requirements. This problem has disproportionately affected smaller communities because they generally lack the economies of scale to absorb additional costs.