Two documents have recently come out of the Environmental Protection Agency that help shed some light on the future direction of EPA and its State Revolving Loan Fund program. The first document is EPA's fiscal year (FY) 2011 to 2015 strategic plan, which provides a blueprint for advancing EPA's mission and Administrator Lisa Jackson's priorities. Congress requires all federal agencies to develop a strategic plan covering a five-year period, which is updated every three years.

This plan presents five strategic goals for advancing the agency's mission, and five strategies that seek to adapt the EPA's work inside and outside of the agency to meet growing environmental protection needs. The plan will guide the agency over the next five years to foster a renewed commitment to new possibilities for achieving the vision of a cleaner, greener, and more sustainable environment.

The five strategic goals for advancing the agency's mission are:

• Taking action on climate change and improving air quality;
• Protecting America's waters;
• Cleaning up communities and advancing sustainable development;
• Ensuring the safety of chemicals and preventing pollution; and
• Enforcing environmental laws.

The Protecting America's Waters goal calls for greater attention paid to storm water runoff and drinking water quality. Within the Protecting America's Waters Goal, there are two specific objectives - protecting human health, and protecting and restoring watersheds and aquatic ecosystems. To achieve the goal of protecting human health, EPA specifically outlines its desire to continue financing public water system infrastructure to protect and maintain drinking water quality. EPA is also actively working Agency-wide and with external partners and stakeholders to implement a new, multi-faceted drinking water strategy. It is designed to streamline decision making and expand protection to meet the needs of rural, urban, and other communities. To meet the watershed objective, EPA specifically highlights their desire to protect, restore, maintain, and improve water quality by financing wastewater treatment infrastructure. EPA intends to improve the way existing tools are used, explore how innovative tools can be applied, and enhance efforts and cross-media collaboration to protect and prevent water quality impairment in healthy watersheds.

A second document released is EPA's Clean Water and Drinking Water Infrastructure Sustainability Policy. This policy certainly reflects many of the goals expressed in the Strategic Plan as part of its efforts to promote sustainable infrastructure within the water sector. Through this policy, EPA intends to ensure that federal investments, policies, and actions support water infrastructure in efficient and sustainable locations to best aid existing communities, enhance economic competitiveness, and promote affordable neighborhoods. The policy was released in response to a request in the FY 2010 President's budget.

The policy emphasizes the need to build on existing efforts to promote sustainable water infrastructure, working with states and water systems to employ robust, comprehensive planning processes to deliver projects that are cost effective over their life cycle, resource efficient, and consistent with community sustainability goals. The policy encourages communities to develop sustainable systems that employ effective utility management practices to build and maintain the level of technical, financial, and managerial capacity necessary to ensure long-term sustainability.

AGC will closely monitor the Agency's implementation of these policies for any impact they may have on the construction process.

For more information, contact Scott Berry at (703) 837-5321 or berrys@agc.org.

The Water Issues Working Group is an effort led by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce in cooperation with AGC to raise awareness of the concept that water is an investment, not a cost. The group is launching an initiative to demonstrate the value of water to our economy through targeted regional events across the country that address the full range of water cycle issues.

Through wide-ranging dialogues in local communities there will be an opportunity for audiences and stakeholders to discuss regional needs and for participants to explore a full spectrum of governmental and private sector policy and funding solutions.

The official roll out for this series of regional water events series is Tuesday, November 23, 2010 in Somerset, New Jersey. We are partnering with the Somerset Business Partnership and American Water for the first program to discuss Aging Water Infrastructure challenges and solutions. Tentative dates, locations and topics for upcoming events can be found below:

• November 2010, Somerset, N.J. – Aging Water Infrastructure
• January 2011, Austin, Texas – Water Supply/Sustainability/Conservation
• February 2011, Miami, Fla. – Desalination/Innovative Water Technologies
• April 2011, Lincoln, Neb. – Agricultural Water Use
• June 2011, Los Angeles, Calif. – Energy-Water Nexus
• August 2011, New York City, N.Y. – Water Reuse

AGC will continue to play a key role in this group and contribute to this valuable discussion about the importance that water and the infrastructure associated with it plays in the economy and our lives.

For more information, contact Scott Berry at (703) 837-5321 or berrys@agc.org.