The Plan

Summary

We offer twelve proposals to make tap water service in the United States more excellent, open, and equitable, following the framework outlined in Chapter 8. The first set of reforms relate to improving the excellence of tap water service in the United States. They include consolidation of America’s 50,000 water systems, improvement to drinking water regulation, improvement to tap water aesthetics, increased investment in infrastructure, and increased investment in human capital in the water industry. Our next set of proposals deal with making drinking water services more open. They include the development of water system report cards, increasing the visibility and public nature of water infrastructure, and improving outreach to citizen-consumers. Our final set of reforms deals with equity. These reforms include making water services universal in the United States, conducting distributional analyses when making and implementing environmental rules, expanding the regulatory role of public utilities commissions, and embedding equity in the administration of water services.