Waterworks: Public Water System Watershed

The Waterworks is an approximately 500-acre undeveloped, forested parcel located on the border between Waterbury and Stowe. The sole purpose of this land is to provide a safe, adequate, and reliable supply of source water to meet the current and future demand of the District’s users.

The district’s objective is to collect a drinking water supply that:

1. meets or, preferably, exceeds all state and federal requirements for quality;

2. is acquired and managed in a reliable manner that most economically minimizes disruptions in service; and

3. is of sufficient quantity to meet expected demand today and most economically in the long run, thereby avoiding unnecessary increases in operations costs or capital upgrades. 

Today, a substantial amount of the water the watershed supplies is surface water, which is more economically treated and piped by gravity to the municipality than ground water, which requires pumping. The District Commissioners and staff approach decisions with respect to this land with a core belief: This source water must be protected to serve the district in perpetuity.

EFUD works to meet its obligations in the most cost-effective ways possible, as set out in its charter and in statute, which, because of the district’s narrow purpose, limit the scope of its jurisdiction. Within its jurisdiction is policymaking for the management and protection of the watershed. To that end, the commission is considering whether to adopt a formal policy on recreational and other non-EFUD-related activities in the watershed.

The watershed has long been used for unsanctioned recreational activities, primarily hiking and hunting. However, in recent years, there has been a significant increase, in both scope and scale, in such activities, which, if allowed to continue unmanaged or, possibly, if not prohibited altogether, pose a risk to source water quality protection and public health. Among matters of concern are pathogen contamination, erosion causing elevated levels of particulate matter suspended in the water (which can interfere with disinfection and increase the concentration of disinfectant by-products in the drinking water), and forever chemicals. Degradation of the quality of supply can raise the cost of treatment and potentially require a change in treatment technology, increasing capital and operations costs.

And, in the same way that some of the challenges we face today were not well understood thirty years ago, there may be other contamination risks of which we’re unaware today, but which diligence and care might mitigate.