Full Description

The constantly expanding diversity of contaminantsfrom changing land use, coupled with greaterpollutant loads and fewer natural barriers, hasmade treatment more challenging and expensive andincreased the chances that contaminants will reach ourtaps. The 1996 amendments to the Safe DrinkingWater Act required that states conduct a Source WaterAssessment for every public water supply in the country,reflecting a renewed national focus on source waterprotection as a tool to prevent the contamination ofdrinking water supplies. Although some resources wereprovided to the states to conduct assessments, noresources have been appropriated for protection strategyimplementation, neither have any mandates thatthey occur been issued. Tools and resources are neededto inform and motivate local and regional protectionefforts.This article describes a successful process thatdemonstrates how locally driven source water protectionefforts that leverage local, state, and federalresources can lead to successful implementation ofprotection strategies. This study highlights how watersupply managers can work with elected officials, landuseplanners, watershed associations, and others intheir source area to conduct geographic informationsystems analyses, identify threats to supplies from landuse, and develop joint efforts to address those threatsthrough a variety of funding sources. Includes 19 references, tables, figures.

Product Details

Edition: Vol. 96 - No. 4 Published: 04/01/2004 Number of Pages: 15 File Size: 1 file , 5.9 MB