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Structuring WIN for Success
CASA and AMSA
should support WIN as well as responsible reserve funding
[05/01/01, Commentary by Blake Anderson]
I believe that that the WIN
initiative must have two elements to be effective and to become law:
First, local share funding.
Like the original Clean Water Act, a local share must be part of
the formula—possibly a 75:25 federal/local share for critical
situations and a 50:50 share for non-critical situations. The
locals must be encouraged to raise fees for either pay-as-you-go
funding or to pay off local financing.
Elected officials must bite down on
the fee bullet now. Federal money may give them reason to do the
right thing and give them the political cover as well. The
original CWA was a terrific jump start to get funding going. The
WIN program will take the nation to the next level. If the CWA was
the equivalent of the Saturn booster engine, then WIN is the
second stage rocket to get the payload into orbit.
Second, asset management.
In exchange for federal funding, the local entities must adopt, in
both policy and in practice, basic elements of asset management.
Regular maintenance, regular inspections, regular publicly-reported inventories of the infrastructure asset base, a financial
plan for short term and long term rehabilitation and replacement,
a designated reserve policy, etc. Asset management is absolutely
necessary to keep the nation's and the states' water protected
from public sewage systems.
With these two elements in place,
the federal government will have reason to help the locals out
this one time. This gives the federal government a way to motivate
local governments to get off the dime and invest in their
infrastructure.
CASA and AMSA should Support WIN.
For some CASA and AMSA members, there's reason to say
"no" to this program. They've got their funding in
place. They've been responsible. They've done the right thing.
They, for good reason, resent those agencies that have not been
responsible. Fine. All good points.
But there are some realities. For
the big regional systems that have satellite systems, I&I and
upstream spills are having major impacts. The aging satellite
systems upstream of the regional systems cause all sorts of storm
water related problems. The public does not differentiate between
sewer spills and which public agency is responsible. They just
hear the word "spill." The political pressures mount.
And it doesn't even matter if the spills are in a particular
community. Headlines about LA have an impact on attitudes in
Orange County. And visa versa.
The effect? A legislator in
Sacramento or Washington DC decides something must be done,
a bill goes into the hopper, and away we go, trying to bat away
one more law or regulation that makes it impossible for the good
guys to operate sensibly and cost effectively.
The CASA members have another
reason to back WIN: The Little Hoover Commission on Special
Districts. CASA must take a proactive and offensive position
on all of the criticism that Little Hoover leveled on wastewater
treatment special districts. We were criticized for having money
in the bank! For goodness sake, we ought to be held up as examples
of responsible public agencies. The cities and other entities that
are cash- poor should look to us with admiration. But that won't
happen if we try to be quiet and defensive. We should be
celebrating and publicizing our financial strengths, not
sulking around about them.
The CASA board and staff should be
producing brochures about how much money we have in reserves and
why we need it and where we are going to spend it. We all should
be telling our member agencies about the frighteningly huge and real
shortfalls that are present throughout California. We should be
asking the public whether we want to look like shiny new
California or the rusty aging Midwest. We should be making the
argument that public infrastructure is the basis for quality of
life and Pacific Rim competitiveness.
CASA should get behind WIN,
insisting on a fee-based system that gets local dollars to match
federal dollars.
CASA and AMSA have meetings in May.
CASA ought to revisit this issue in Yosemite. AMSA ought to
revisit this issue in Washington DC. CASA should take a position
that is formally conveyed to AMSA for its consideration. I'll be
at CASA.
- Blake Anderson is General
Manager of the Orange County Sanitation District
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