Please click the links for a sample copy of the EPA Support Letter along with the EPA Letter of Support Instructions.

The Kentucky Rural Water Association is hosting a Legislative Breakfast to provide KRWA members the opportunity to meet with their legislators during the 2012 Session of the Kentucky General Assembly. The breakfast will provide a forum to express your views on legislation affecting utilities and discuss the many accomplishments of your utility.

KRWA will be sending an invitation to each of the members of the Kentucky Legislature. However, to help make this a highly successful event, we urge you to contact your legislators personally to ensure their attendance. Your legislators can be contacted at their offices in Frankfort at 502.564.8100, or a message may be left for individual legislators at 800.372.7181.

To assist us in planning the breakfast, please register online by Friday, January 13, 2012.

For room reservations call the Capital Plaza Hotel: 502-227-5100

(Room block expires on January 5, 2012)

Other hotels in the area include:

Best Western 502.695.6111
Fairfield Inn 502.695.8881
Hampton Inn 502.223.7600

The Compliance Check program provides an enhanced level of assistance to Kentucky’s water and wastewater utilities that helps them deal effectively and proactively with the ever increasing regulatory burden. Maintaining full compliance with the Safe Drinking Water Act, Clean Water Act and other state and federal requirements has never been more difficult.  The Compliance Check program provides participating utilities with management of compliance data, research on regulatory requirements, and assistance with all reporting requirements.

The development and distribution of the CCR will prove to be less burdensome because KRWA will already have most of the analytical data and other information necessary to complete the report because of participation in the program.

In an effort to minimize the financial costs of public notices, KRWA representatives met with personnel with the U.S. Postal Service and regulatory agencies to determine specific mailing requirements. As a result, new templates have been developed that utilize the back of utility bills for public notice language, reducing the utility cost for public notices from several thousand dollars to just the cost of the ink.

The Lead and Copper Rule was recently revised and one of the new requirements is that utilities must now notify each residence of the analysis results of the sample collected at that location. The Compliance Check program developed a Lead and Copper Package that allows this task to be completed in minutes.

Compliance Check reviews all factors associated with monitoring and sampling requirements. Several times during the past year utilities or their contract lab was alerted to collect an overlooked sample or collect additional samples. In some instances a complete sample schedule was developed along with a calendar with specific dates highlighted for specific types of samples. Since the utility is ultimately responsible for all sampling requirements, it is necessary for the utility to ensure that samples are collected using a Standard Operating Procedure (SOP). Compliance Check is currently developing a Sampling SOP that will be provided to all utilities participating in the program.

Drinking water utilities throughout Kentucky use a recordkeeping package that makes all calculations and conversions and provides alerts when values may cause a violation to occur. Compliance Check personnel is currently making revisions to the Recordkeeping Package. The revised package will have additional features and will be provided only to drinking water systems participating in the Compliance Check program.

Having someone else reviewing data, researching regulations, and providing assistance allows utilities to remain focused on their primary responsibilities of producing quality products and service for their community. Compliance Check leads to improved compliance, peace of mind and real savings!

This legislation will allow the nation’s drinking water utilities to save money and increase efficiency by utilizing modern communications technology when sharing annual water quality reports with their customers. H.R. 1340 and S. 1578, if enacted, would save Kentucky’s public water systems approximately $725,000 annually in mailing costs alone. 

The Safe Drinking Water Act (SDWA) Amendments of 1996 require public drinking water systems to “mail” water quality reports to all customers on an annual basis. Fifteen years after enactment of this law, our members report spending thousands of dollars each and every year to distribute these reports through the mail, even though electronic communication options have become prevalent. The money now spent on printing and mailing these reports could instead be invested in infrastructure upgrades that improve water quality and possibly create jobs.

KRWA has invited Kentucky’s congressional delegation to look at H.R. 1340 and S. 1578 as a way to help public water systems in Kentucky and across the United States save millions of dollars every year. H.R. 1340 and S. 1578 eliminate the requirement for public water systems to provide an annual water quality report (Consumer Confidence Report) via mail to every consumer. H.R. 1340 and S. 1578 update the SDWA to allow drinking water utilities to distribute water quality reports over the Internet, while also ensuring that the public maintains robust access to water quality information. KRWA supports the public’s right to know about the quality of their drinking water and agree that utilities should continue to be required to mail reports announcing violations of federal water quality standards to their customers. We also support allowing individual customers to request a paper copy of a water quality report by mail.

Please contact your Congressman and Senator’s McConnell and Paul to voice your support of H.R. 1340 and S. 1578. 

If you have any questions or need additional information, please do not hesitate to contact the KRWA office.

The Utility Management Institute has been offered to KRWA members with no tuition cost for the last twelve years because of funding provided by EPA through a grant to Western Kentucky University. Unfortunately, this funding ceased over a year ago. Nevertheless, KRWA has continued to offer the six courses that make up the UMI through the use of internal Association funds.

The KRWA Board of Directors is fully supportive of continuing the UMI program that now claims over 250 graduates. However, they have decided to charge for this popular training for the first time to help defray a portion of the costs associated with offering the six courses at locations throughout Kentucky.

Anyone who is currently enrolled in UMI will continue receiving the courses without cost through the end of September, 2012. Current participants should contact the KRWA office to register for additional sessions.

New students who enroll in UMI courses will be charged as follows:

All six courses: $695 (two or more students $625)

Students will have two years to complete all six courses at this discounted price.

SCHEDULE FOR 2011/2012 (with individual cost for courses for new students)

Utility Management 101 – November 15-17, 2011                                        $200

Kentucky Dam Village State Resort Park, Gilbertsville, KY

Utility Organization, Regulation and Law – March 21-22, 2012            $150

Elizabethtown Tourism & Convention Bureau, Elizabethtown, KY

Utility Finance & Administration – April 18-19, 2012                                $150

Park Mammoth Resort, Park City, KY

Human Resource Management for Utilities – July 11-12, 2012              $150

Morehead Conference Center, Morehead, KY

Modern Technology & Utility Management – August 8, 2012                 $100

General Butler State Resort Park, Carrollton, KY

Public Relations in Utility Management – September 19, 2012              $100

Louisville Water Company, Louisville, KY

This workshop will consist of presentations, generator training, and a tabletop exercise (TTX).  The presentations will cover topics related to KYWARN and water sector preparedness and response.  The TTX will be based on a hypothetical incident designed to bring together the water and public safety sectors to discuss roles and responsibilities during a natural disaster.

Thunderstorms, floods, and winter ice storms can affect Kentucky every year which emphasizes the need for preparedness at all levels.  The presentations and TTX will demonstrate the value of KYWARN during an emergency that impacts the water sector and will explain how KYWARN works across the state to provide resources during emergencies.

An application is pending for CEUs for licensed Kentucky water and wastewater operators who participate in the training.

The event will be held on Wednesday, October 26, 2011, at the Corbin Center which is located at 222 Corbin Center Drive in Corbin, KY 40701.

Event schedule: Wednesday, October 26^th

• Check-In:                                   8:30 am – 9:00 am
• Presentations/Training:          9:00 am – 12:30 pm
• Lunch Break:                           12:30 pm – 1:00 pm
• Tabletop Exercise:                  1:00 pm – 4:30 pm

For more information please contact Will Keefer of the Horsley Witten Group at wkeefer@horsleywitten.com or 508-833-6600.

To RSVP/register for the training please go to www.horsleywitten.com/warn/.

Once registered, you will be emailed a confirmation sheet containing directions to the training event location.  We look forward to your participation in this important event.

Sincerely,

Brad Murphy, Northern Kentucky Water District

The KRWA Board of Directors is fully supportive of continuing the UMI program that now includes over 250 graduates.  However, they have decided to charge for this popular training for the first time to help defray a portion of the costs associated with offering the six courses at locations throughout Kentucky.

Anyone who is currently enrolled in UMI will continue receiving the courses without cost through the end of September, 2012.  Current participants should contact the KRWA office to register for additional sessions.

New students who enroll in UMI courses will be charged as follows:

All six courses:  $695

Students will have two years to complete all six courses at the discounted price.