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The Drinking Water Security Committee of the Association of State Drinking Water Administrators (ASDWA), U.S. EPA Region 5’s Water Security Advisor, and the Evanston, Ill., Water Utility have partnered to create an outline for a “Water Emergency Roundtable Discussion.”  This Roundtable Discussion Outline is based on an event hosted by the Evanston Water Utility with facilitated support from EPA Region 5 in September 2009.  The Discussion Outline re-scales the original Roundtable toward the needs of smaller water systems; creates a step-by-step process to host a similar discussion; and provides templates, models, and scripts to support the various aspects of conducting and managing a successful Roundtable Discussion.

This is a low-cost approach, which can be helpful in enhancing collaborative partnerships among state drinking water programs, water-utility organizations, and the communities that they both support.  It also goes a long way toward helping those communities better engage with their own emergency and utility service providers to create an effective and efficient foundation for community resiliency. We hope that utilities, communities, and states will find it useful.

What is it about?

The Roundtable Discussion is designed to improve the protection of public health and safety, and increase community resiliency by increasing mutual understanding among utilities, water service customers, and emergency responders; and by enhancing emergency-response plans for water supply emergencies.

Why should there be a discussion?

Water is an essential service for any community.  However, most water customers – hospitals, shopping malls, schools, restaurants, and industrial parks to name just a few – don’t have a clear sense of what “no water” would mean for their operation, business, or industry.  They, like most residential customers, have come to rely on the local water system to always be able to provide potable water for drinking, bathing, fireflow, HVAC, sanitation, and operational use.  What happens if/when this is no longer the case?  How can a community plan to maintain its economic vitality, prevent the spread of disease and infection, and meet the expectations of its residents in the face of a longstanding water crisis?  This discussion begins to look at these issues.

Download the document: Water Emergency Roundtable – Outline for Discussion