Sustainable Funding for PWD’s Green City, Clean Waters
Sustainable Funding for Philadelphia's Green City, Clean Waters Plan
The City of Philadelphia adopted the Green City, Clean Waters (GCCW) plan in 2011 as part of its regulatory obligation under the Clean Water Act to reduce pollution resulting from combined sewer overflows. The 25-year plan envisions the City implementing approximately 9,564 greened acres (GA) (34% of the combined sewer impervious areas) with green stormwater infrastructure (GSI), which along with other stormwater practices will capture 85% of baseline annual wet weather flow into the sewer system. The plan represents a transition from managing stormwater based solely on a gray infrastructure system to managing stormwater through a hybrid system that incorporates both gray and green infrastructure. The implementation cost was initially estimated at $2.4 billion and updated to $4.5 billion in 2021. The GCCW plan implementation has generated significant benefits, including $60 million added to local economies and expansion of the local GSI industry (an estimated 430 jobs), according to a five-year review by the Sustainable Business Network and Econsult Solutions issued in 2016. The report found that GSI is generally cheaper than conventional built infrastructure, which is vital in keeping rates affordable, while also creating additional neighborhood benefits.
This report, completed with support from the William Penn Foundation, considers the sustainability of the funding and financing strategies that support reaching the target set out in the GCCW plan for the City’s hybrid stormwater management system, with specific focus on private non-residential land and non-City owned public land.
Click the link below to download the full report.
Funding Resilience in Wisconsin Small & Mid-Sized Cities
Funding Resilience in Wisconsin Small & Mid-Sized Cities
Throughout 2021, in partnership with staff from the Cities of Sheboygan and Green Bay, Wisconsin, American Rivers, WaterNow Alliance, and One Water Econ worked advance our collective understanding of the incentives and financing options that could be appropriate to support green stormwater infrastructure (GSI) programs in mid-sized cities.
The team reviewed regulatory and non-regulatory policies and explored existing programs in each municipality, and then provided an analysis of financial resources and strategies that would support a suite of recommended incentive programs and financing options. This report grows out of that experience and is intended to provide an overview of GSI funding, financing, and incentive programs that are relevant to small and mid- sized municipalities in Wisconsin.
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Navigating GI Maintenance with Capitalized Establishment Costs
Navigating Green Infrastructure Maintenance with Capitalized Establishment Costs
For nearly two decades, local stormwater managers have recognized green infrastructure (GI) as an effective, multi-benefit approach to manage stormwater. GI provides significant benefits for combating the water quality and climate change related challenges that municipalities face. In addition, GI is a centerpiece One Water strategy; it can capture and reuse stormwater to enhance water supply reliability, creating resilience to drought. Beyond these water management benefits, GI generates community and economic co-benefits including local green jobs, among others.
Yet, GI has mostly remained on the fringes of stormwater management. A “nice to have” amenity. To realize its potential and have a substantial impact for communities, GI needs to scale up rapidly. Lack of funds to pay for GI maintenance is often cited as a leading barrier to getting to scale.
This Environmental Policy Innovation Center and WaterNow report presents a solution GI practitioners and proponents can add to the toolkit for navigating this funding barrier and getting to scale: ensuring that the three to five-year vegetative establishment period for GI is treated as a capital cost instead of a maintenance expense. Recognizing establishment period costs as capital costs unlocks access to key financing options.
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Financing the Future: How to Pay for Turf Replacement
Financing the Future: How to Pay for Turf Replacement in Colorado
To achieve thirsty, non-essential turf conversion at larger scale, Colorado cities and utilities will need to be positioned to make significant investments in these programs, as they would for other water supply projects. A growing number of Colorado water providers, as well as utilities throughout the West, are putting programs in place to encourage their public and private customers to swap non-essential turfgrass for waterwise landscaping. Target customers include commercial, industrial, and institutional property owners, home owners associations, multi-family residential building owners, and single family residents, as well as municipal departments that use a significant amount of water. Turf replacements are, in many ways, the next low-hanging fruit for reaching the State's water conservation objectives, and ensuring a secure water supply. This paper examines some of the more promising funding and financing pathways available to water providers to scale up turf replacement locally.
Governance Options & Opportunities
Governance Options, and Opportunities, for Public Clean Water Agencies in a COVID-19 World
By: Moonshot Missions for National Association of Clean Water Agencies
"The COVID-19 pandemic heightened beyond measure the threats posed by these existing challenges. Protecting courageous water professionals that deliver drinking water and clean water services from exposure to health risks requires social distancing and staggered shifts – accentuating the reliance on critical and hard-to-replace essential personnel. Support for the public health of all citizens, particularly those in underserved communities, has fostered widespread suspension of service shut-offs, late fees, and the advent of new payment plans.
The good news is that – despite revenue and operational impacts — the water sector overall is resilient and has demonstrated terrific leadership in its response to the pandemic. Promising technology enables distance operations and management, virtual control systems are field-tested and proving worthy of further study or implementation. Most importantly, utilities have moved quickly to consider and implement new governance, procurement, and financial management systems. One of the astonishing stories of the pandemic is how water, this lifegiving resource critical to hygiene and stemming the spread of the virus, continues to flow safely and largely without interruption despite the current challenges."
NACWA partnered with Moonshot Missions to create this checklist they recommend a clean water utility review before considering or accepting proposals for private funding, management and/or ownership.
Continue reading the full report and access the checklist by clicking the link below.
Multifaceted intra-city water system arrangements
Multifaceted intra-city water system arrangements in California: Influences and implications for residents
By: Gregory Pierce, Kyra Gmoser-Daskalakis
Some cities directly provide drinking water and other utility services to their residents, whereas others contract out these responsibilities in full or in part, with considerable implications for service and non-service outcomes. There is a robust literature considering reasons for city-private provider binaries, as well as a growing number of studies assessing the rise in special district service provision, mixed service delivery arrangements, and inter- municipal service delivery within metropolitan contexts. On the other hand, there are few studies assessing city-level prevalence of these three main provider types jointly, as well as fully accounting for the diversity of institutional arrangements in drinking water service within individual cities.
This study provides an empirical profile of and analyzes influences on diverse city-level water service provider arrangements using a dataset compiled for all 482 cities in California. The analysis shows, among other things, that cities which run their own water system exclusively are more likely to institute conservation policies, and provide suggestive evidence that residents living in cities served by multiple water systems are exposed to wide variance in water rates. Thus, the report concludes, water system fragmentation within city boundaries has implications for resource management policy and equity in intra-city resident essential service outcomes.
Click the link below to read the full report.
Does it Matter for Water Conservation?
Public vs Private: Does it Matter for Water Conservation? Insights from California
By: G. Kallis, I. Ray, J. Fulton, J.E. McMahon
In this report, researchers in California evaluate three questions:
- Does the public view private and public utilities differently, and if so, does this affect attitudes to conservation?
- Do public and private utilities differ in their approaches to conservation?
- Do differences in the approaches of the utilities, if any, relate to differences in public attitudes?
Based on their survey, the report explains that, overall, California's public utilities appear more proactive and target-oriented in asking their customers to conserve than their private counterparts. Click the link below to read the full report.
From Pragmatic to Polarized?
From pragmatic to politicized? The future of water remunicipalization in the United States
By: Thomas M. Hanna, David A. McDonald
The United States has experienced swings of public and private operation of its water services for more than 150 years. This paper examines the most recent swing, that of remunicipalization. The authors argue that much of this remunicipalization is taking place for ‘pragmatic’ reasons related to cost savings and service quality, but there are also signs of more ‘politicized’ forms of water remunicipalization taking place, similar to efforts elsewhere in the world where the process has often involved heated ideological debates and mass mobilizations. Combined with a growing politicization of other social, economic, and environmental issues in the US, water remunicipalization could become more politicized in the future, but a fragmented ‘pro-public’ movement, combined with ongoing efforts to outsource water services and growing resistance to remunicipalization from private water companies, may constrain this potential.
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Our Public Water Future
Our Public Water Future
Published by Transnational Institute (TNI), Public Services International Research Unit (PSIRU), Multinationals Observatory, Municipal Services Project (MSP) and the European Federation of Public Service Unions (EPSU)
This book aims to draw lessons and stimulate debates on water remunicipalisation as an under-researched topic of high relevance for citizens, policymakers and scholars alike. Based on empirical data, the book documents the rise of water remunicipalisation across developed, transition, and developing countries in the last 15 years. Drawing on contributions by activists, practitioners, and academics with direct experience and knowledge of remunicipalisation, the book argues that remunicipalisation is a socially and economically viable policy option for local authorities and the communities they represent. As such, the book is intended to serve as a resource for building alliances among diverse social actors – including public water managers and decision-makers, workers and their trade unions, civic organisations and social movements, experts and academics – to encourage social learning and promote this new form of public service provision.
Click the link below to download the full resource.
Water Privatization Threatens Workers, Consumers and Local Economies
Water Privatization Threatens Workers, Consumers and Local Economies
Report examining the three main ways that private operation and management of water and sewer systems can affect workers and their communities:
- Job cuts
- Pay and benefits cuts
- Loss of unions
To read the full report click the link below.
