Pennsylvania’s abundant supplies of water provide not only a mainstay amenity for residents but also a key advantage for business growth. The mission of building cooperation among stakeholders statewide for protection of some 14,500 public sources of raw water falls to the Water Resources Education Network of the Pennsylvania League of Women Voters.
Having worked on this mission with the Department of Environmental Protection since 2002, the network completes its 36th and 37th local workshops on public water supplies this month, with a workshop yesterday at Susquehanna University at Selinsgrove in Snyder County and another on April 22 in Charleroi, Washington County.
Is development of the Marcellus Shale an active issue? Julie Kollar, program manager for WREN, says, “If it’s not energy development, it may be some other concern, whether its agricultural runoff or storm-water pollution. When you look at the potential contaminants, today it could be one thing; tomorrow it could be entirely different. We’re thinking generations ahead. Whatever industry comes into the state, people want to protect Pennsylvania’s water resources.”
WREN’s strategy then is that an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. According to the Environmental Protection Agency, planning to prevent water supply contamination is five to 20 times less expensive than cleanups.
Kollar is especially enthusiastic about one item certain to be discussed at the Charleroi workshop. Western Pennsylvania’s River Alert Information Network has just received funding to form a new system for early detection among the 333 public water systems that draw from the Three Rivers basin of Western Pennsylvania. The network offers a regional approach to protecting water supplies already established for the Schuylkill and Susquehanna rivers.
“There is much more partnership on this issue now,” Kollar says. “Water does not fall under any single jurisdiction, and you can’t have a community without a clean drinking water supply.”
Source: Water Resources Education Network, Julie Kollar
Writer: Joseph Plummer
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