What do we want from the Water Utility?

At Monday's Sherman Neighborhood Association meeting we had a lengthy discussion about Well 7, the city water well next to Shabazz High on Sherman Avenue. The Water Utility is planning to install an iron/managese filter, and the discussion was about whether or how this would be a prelude to boosting the well's output.

Meanwhile, the saga of the smart meters continues...

Group of Madison residents asks for state investigation into water meters plan

Citing the potential health impacts of radio frequency emissions, a group of 33 Madison residents has asked the state Public Service Commission to investigate the Madison Water Utility's $13-million plan to install an automated meter system that allows water meters to be read remotely.

I know Dolores Kester, the lead complainant, from the neighborhood association, and I'm sure it's no surprise that I respectfully disagree with her assessment of the purported risks of smart meters. Although the Water Utility certainly hasn't helped itself by moving forward with the pilot phase before the opt-out policy is resolved (currently scheduled for an August 7 council vote) or by proposing an ordinance with absurd access requirements and steep new fines, I don't support the PSC complaint.

But the content of the complaint, and the concern and distrust over Well 7, raise a bigger question with me: What exactly is it that we want from the Water Utility?

We don't think about where our water comes from, or how it gets from the source to our taps. Of all the infrastructure we depend on, we probably take water for granted more than roads, electricity, or anything else. Clean, cheap water -- as much as we want, whenever we want it -- isn't just an expectation, it's an assumption. How lucky and privileged we are!

God knows the Water Utility has had its problems of late. We certainly wouldn't be talking about Well 7 if water quality and pollution issues weren't forcing the city to re-engineer the water supply for the entire East Side. There isn't another City of Madison agency that's had so much dirty laundry aired in the papers these last 5 or 6 years.

Here's the thing...in the grand scheme of things, the Water Utility's management problems aren't that important. What's important are the big questions that'll determine how we get our water over the next 50 years. Water is such an invisible part of our infrastructure, but it's the one that has the most direct impact on our health and well-being. We need to use it more efficiently and catch up on decades of deferred or ignored maintenance. We can't keep pushing costs out into the future.

So I ask Ms. Kester, the Powells, their 30 fellow complainants, and the rest of my neighbors: What do you want -- fundamentally -- from Madison's public water utility?