In a recent article posted on November 11, 2011 to the KRWA website entitled KRWA Requests Congressional Support for CCR Publishing Legislation, KRWA 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 eliminates 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.

We ask that all utilities located in the Kentucky’s 2^nd Congressional District send a message of thanks to Congressman Guthrie for his much needed support.  We encourage all KRWA member utilities to contact their Congressman and Senators McConnell and Paul to voice their support of H.R. 1340 and S. 1578.

Kentucky’s colleges and universities are trying to kick the plastic water bottle habit. Their solution? Installing “hydration stations” that give students, faculty and staff all the tap water they can pour into their own multi-use containers.

Some colleges elsewhere — including the College of St. Benedict and Macalester College in Minnesota, and the University of Winnipeg in Manitoba — have banned the sale of bottled water altogether. Kentucky’s colleges are taking a more moderate approach.

Much of the movement toward examining the extent of single-use bottled water on campus comes from the increase in awareness of sustainability issues and environmentally friendly projects on campuses, and the “Take Back the Tap” drive by the non-profit Food and Water Watch to increase tap water use.

It’s not just colleges that are kicking back against bottled water, which often costs more than $1 a bottle. In 2007, San Francisco banned the use of city funds to buy single-use plastic water bottles in 2007, when California Lt. Gov. Gavin Newsom was mayor there, and Toronto banned the sale and use of bottled water on city premises in 2008.

Louisville Mayor Greg Fischer took action against the plastic profusion as soon as he was sworn in. “When the mayor took office, he got rid of all the plastic bottles,” spokesman Chris Poynter said. The mayor’s office doesn’t have a designated hydration-station cooler. (“It’s called the faucet,” Poynter said.) In addition, Louisville festivals and events use hydration stations in which a patron buys a $2 cup and can fill it with water all day.

Lexington mayor’s office spokesman Susan Straub said that the city no longer offers bottled water to guests because it doesn’t have money to do so. If visitors request water, they are given a drink from the tap.

Students say the hydration stations are easy and convenient.

“I have a refillable aluminum water bottle that I bring with me all the time,” said Chloe Hollon, a student assistant at UK’s Student Center. “It’s great. It’s really convenient.”

Moving away from bottled water has been one of the most discussed issues in campus environmental activism for years, said Paul Rowland, executive director of the Association for the Advancement of Sustainability in Higher Education. “We’ve been seeing a huge uptick in the last two years with respect to this issue,” he said.

Campuses usually start looking askance at single-use plastic bottles because of the waste they cause, Rowland said.

Some institutions set a goal of reducing waste by as much as their annual consumption of plastic water bottles, Rowland said. “They come to the conclusion, ‘This will pay for itself in a few years,’” he said.

At UK, the impetus has been sustainability initiatives that have made students question how to change their habits — including the frequent purchase of single-use plastic water bottles.

“What we’re seeing is encouragement of using the refillables rather than a banning” of the bottles, said Shane Tedder, UK’s sustainability coordinator. “There’s been really a student-led effort to get water fountains that have a bottle refill to them.”

But don’t look for bottled water to suddenly cease being available at UK. The campus vending machines are run by the Coca-Cola Co., which sells bottled water under its Dasani brand.

UK has hydration stations in its Student Center, its fitness centers and its recently remodeled Keeneland Hall dormitory, and the school gave out thousands of aluminum multi-use bottles at its fall orientation.

Tedder said that in the future, whenever UK has a water fountain scheduled to be serviced or replaced, consideration will be given to adding a hydration station for students to fill bottles. Dormitories, classrooms and libraries are all likely spots to be considered, he said.

A hydration station can be either a goose-neck attachment off a water fountain or a rectangular insert above the fountain bowl that dispenses chilled water into reusable bottles.

UK spokesman Gail Hairston said the amount of water pumped from hydration stations in the Student Center and Johnson Center fitness complex has been enough to fill nearly 460,000 water bottles. That is impressive given that although the Student Center stations were installed in September 2010, those in the Johnson Center began operation only last summer.

At Transylvania University in Lexington, where the campus and student population are smaller and the soda machine presence is less pervasive, the school is trying to shed most of its bottled-water trappings.

The college installed a hydration station near its pool as a pilot measure, and it staffed a table at a recent sustainability fair to make students aware of the waste and cost of bottled water.

The station has been a success and is “the first strategy that we’re working on in eliminating bottled water from campus,” Transylvania sustainability coordinator Angela Dossett said.

But there are obstacles, including buildings with older pipes and water that doesn’t taste oh-so-fresh.

Nonetheless, Dossett said, tap water is much cheaper than bottled water. “We will be looking toward becoming a bottle-less campus,” she said.

Centre College in Danville has installed pilot hydration stations in its Olin Hall science and math building.

Each station cost about $1,000 to set up, Centre spokesman Michael Strysick said, and was paid for by an unrestricted gift to the college.

“It is a successful program,” Strysick said. “It is one we would like to expand.”

Kentucky-American Water, the local utility, has leaped onto the tap-water bandwagon with its own Hydration Station — a trailer that hooks to a spigot or a fire hydrant and gives guests at community events all the chilled water they can drink.

Reach Cheryl Truman at (859) 231-3202 or 1-800-950-6397, Ext. 3202.

2011 EXPO Photos

In addition to touring the 46 exhibits, attendees enjoyed two fun-filled days of games and learning and great music entertainment provided by the band, No Xcuses, featuring KRWA’s own Dell Harris!  The Expo would not be complete without the great barbeque provided by Steve Gott, S & K Equipment Company and refreshments provided by Kentucky Engineering Group, PLLC.   We sincerely appreciate all of our sponsors for their gracious support and generous contributions to this fun and successful event!

• American Development Corporation
• Brenntag Mid-South, Inc.
• C. I. Thornburg Co., Inc.
• Conco Spray Solutions, LLC
• Construction Site Services (dba CCS Pipe & Meter)
• Ditchwitch of Kentucky, Inc.
• Fouser Environmental Services
• G & C Supply Co., Inc.
• HD Supply Waterworks
• HDR/Quest Engineers
• Kentucky Association of Counties
• Kentucky Glass Lined Tanks
• Kenvirons, Inc.
• Leakage Consultants
• Lewis Municipal Sales
• McCoy & McCoy Laboratories, Inc.
• Morgan Keegan & Company
• REI Consultants, Inc.
• Smith-Blair, Inc.
• Straeffer Pump & Supply, Inc.
• Vermeer of Kentucky, Inc.
• Wascon, Inc.
• Wet or Dry Tank Inspection

KRWA would also like to thank the following companies and organizations who provided excellent training opportunities for attendees:

• A. J. Enterprises
• American Development Corporation
• Aulick Chemicals
• C. I. Thornburg Company, Inc.
• Conco Spray Solutions
• Culy Construction
• ICS Healy-Ruff
• JCM Industries
• Kentucky Division of Compliance Assistance
• Kentucky Glass Lined Tanks
• Lewis Municipal Sales
• Mueller Company
• Wascon, Inc.
• Wet or Dry Tank Inspections

Be watching the KRWA website for next year’s dates!

FRANKFORT, KY.– Since declaring a state of emergency nearly three weeks ago, Governor Steve Beshear made his third trip to western Kentucky earlier this week, continuing his strong support of local, state and federal relief efforts for flood victims there.

“From day one, my administration has worked diligently to aid recovery in the areas of the Commonwealth hit hard by this flooding,” Beshear said. “At this stage, we continue to not only monitor and assist these communities but also work with federal officials to promptly get funding where it is most needed.”

Gov. Beshear was notified May 4 that President Barack Obama approved his request for a major disaster declaration for Kentucky.  Since that time, the Governor has been in constant contact with officials from the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) and the Kentucky Division of Emergency Management (KyEM) as these agencies over the last two weeks have assessed damages in the affected areas.

Currently, FEMA and KyEM have teamed up to examine damages to both public infrastructure and private residences. To date, the FEMA/state teams have conducted state and local government assessments in 53 Kentucky counties and individual/household assessments in 11 counties. These assessments involve the teams inspecting damaged areas, documenting the damages and meeting with local officials in western Kentucky.

Based on the results of these assessments, FEMA has added 11 Kentucky counties to the recent federal disaster declaration.

FEMA and KYEM are asking all residents with property damage to document the damage with photos, save repair receipts and report any damages to their local county emergency manager. For additional information about the flooding in west Kentucky, please view www.fema.gov and www.kyem.ky.gov.

Mosquito taskforce
While in Union County earlier this week, Gov. Beshear shared details with local residents about an internal state taskforce recently created to combat the rising mosquito problem in numerous counties affected by the flooding. The agencies on this taskforce include: the Transportation Cabinet, the Energy and Environment Cabinet, the Finance and Administration Cabinet, the Department for Public Health, the Department of Fish and Wildlife, the Department for Local Government, the Governor’s Office on Agricultural Policy and the Kentucky Department of Agriculture.

“Mosquitoes are not only a nuisance but, in this case, they have become a public health risk and are impeding recovery efforts,” said Gov. Beshear. “I have asked this group to develop and quickly institute a plan to help eradicate the increased numbers of mosquitoes.”

The group is using FEMA as an adviser on the mosquito eradication project since the project is related to the flood disaster in western Kentucky. Once the plan is complete, the agencies of the taskforce will immediately begin to work with local communities throughout western Kentucky where the mosquito population has increased.

With all eyes focused on the receding flood waters of Western Kentucky, violent weather struck Ashland on Tuesday with torrential rain, quarter-sized hail and strong wind and severe lightning.  Flash flooding was reported in several areas throughout eastern Kentucky.  There were wide spread reports of power outages throughout Boyd and Lawrence counties that affected several of the local water and wastewater facilities.  Fortunately, most of the systems “weathered the storm” and are well on their way to restoring service.

Highway officials continue to warn drivers not to attempt to drive on flooded roads. Remember, before traveling to an affected area, check with local authorities. Traffic information for interstates, parkways and major routes is available at 511.ky.gov or by calling 511. In addition, KYTC has a map on its website (www.transportation.ky.gov) indicating road closures.

FRANKFORT — The second week of the special legislative session on Medicaid funding saw two proposals passed in bill form– first in House Bill 1, then in a very different HB 1 as amended and passed in the Senate. And toward week’s end the chambers were back near square one, still locked in a familiar dance, once again looking to be consigned to a fruitless conference committee, still butting heads over their fundamentally different approaches to solving the problem that brought them there.

Then, late Thursday, a ghostly third bill emerged. Actually it was the Senate version of HB 1, but soon-to-be transmuted back to something resembling its original House form through the pen strokes of promised gubernatorial line-item vetoes. And on that promise the House passed HB 1 as amended by the Senate though it contained spending cuts it found unacceptable, adjourned, and waited for the true outlines of the new/old final bill to emerge from the veto process.

So ended the ninth working day of a special session called by the governor immediately after the 2011 regular session adjourned on March 9. So ended the long impasse over how to plug a troublesome hole in Medicaid, and the threat of forced cuts in Medicaid services April 1 if the hole wasn’t patched.

It was a fittingly surprising turn in a legislative season ripe with surprises.

The special session itself was a bit of a surprise, quick-called by a governor invoking the urgency of closing a $139-million shortfall in Medicaid before April 1 to avoid 35-percent cuts in provider reimbursements to doctors, hospitals and others for the remainder of this fiscal year, which ends June 30. Providers themselves (some in testimony at legislative hearings) warned that any such cuts could have catastrophic consequences. They raised the specter of some small rural hospitals and clinics even shuttering.

Medicaid is the state-federal program that provides health coverage for about 800,000 low-income and disabled Kentuckians, and is state government’s fastest-growing expense.

The special-session back story is familiar to anyone who follows the news. The governor early in this winter’s regular session proposed, and the House passed, a plan to bring forward enough money from next year’s Medicaid budget to bridge this year’s gap (the larger $166-million figure usually cited includes some additional state money to capture significant additional federal matching funds). Under the original House Bill 305, the shifted money would be made up next year through new ‘managed care’ initiatives designed to save money in the program. The idea was to confine the Medicaid problem to Medicaid, and let the governor manage the program to solvency.

The Senate strongly questioned that approach and its underlying assumptions. Senate leaders said no way could the administration recoup that much money in such short-term managed-care savings. The chamber amended House Bill 305 to fill the budget gap by cutting state spending more-or-less equally across the board. Education would share the pain, albeit its share would be somewhat less than the rest of state government. But House leaders of both parties objected to any education cuts whatsoever, and so set the stage for a showdown.

The regular session ended with the two chambers at a sticking point similar to this week’s. The chambers’ two formal proposals during the special session, House Bill 1 and its Senate-amended version, inched toward a middle ground, but still failed to resemble anything close to consensus.

Early in the week, the House passed its new bill, with solid bipartisan support in that chamber. It attempted to address Senate concerns that cost-savings alone could not, in so short a time frame, cover the shortfall.

It did so by imposing a catch: If the governor cannot certify to lawmakers by Aug. 15—after managed-care contracts are signed—that the plan and other actions authorized by the General Assembly will achieve savings sufficient to fill the hole in fiscal year 2012, specified cuts would be triggered across state government on Oct. 1.

Exempted from cuts — and this was all along the House line drawn in the sand — was education. That included basic per-pupil SEEK funding for grades K-12, and public universities.

The amended Senate plan moved toward compromise by accepting the notion that the administration might achieve half the savings it says can come from managed care. But it still required spending cuts, pared-back ones of 0.355 percent in the current fiscal year for nearly all state programs, other than base public school funding and postsecondary education. And it made cuts of 1.74 percent in the 2011-12 fiscal year, beginning July 1, to all areas other than public schools, which would have been cut by 0.812 percent.

However, the bill provided that the education cuts be delayed until Jan. 30, 2012. This would allow the 2012 General Assembly to rescind them if the administration could show it had in fact achieved its target for savings through managed-care efficiencies.

Adding to Frankfort’s sense of déjà vu all over again, the bill was poised to go to a conference committee of leaders from both chambers to try to finally, this time, iron out a compromise agreement. A similar conference committee, you will recall, met six times at the end of the regular session before adjourning without agreement, with negotiators arguing from substantially similar positions then as later.

While a casual observer might think the two chambers’ differences at this point were a narrow creek to bridge, the apparent small gap between them was in fact a genuine rift, philosophical, political and profound. In this most nuanced legislative season in memory, no issue and no dispute had been more nuanced than this.

So as another weary weekend approached, Frankfort waited to see if the pressure of April 1 and what that day’s sunrise might bring would connect the dots on a agreement that had so far proven itself to be just plain slippery.

Then Thursday evening, the session uncorked one last surprise, as the electric and unexpected news spread that the House was prepared to approve the amended Senate version of HB 1, on the governor’s written promise that he would use his line-item veto authority to basically return the bill to something approaching its original House form, specifically eliminating spending cuts inserted by the Senate.

After House leaders explained this unconventional move — which asked members to vote on faith for a bill they didn’t like on the promise they’d end up with a law they did — the chamber voted 86-2 to go along. The House then voted to adjourn, effectively removing any possibility of veto overrides, which require both chambers.

“I am pleased to announce that at the start of the new Congress, Michael Higdon will be serving as my Chief of Staff and Will Smith will be serving as the Deputy Staff Director of the Appropriations Committee,” said Rogers. “Both Michael and Will have worked for many years in my office and I have found them to be trusted advisors who have sacrificed so much to serve the people of Kentucky’s Fifth District. I know that Will will be missed by many in Kentucky, but I am pleased that he will continue to work with me on the Appropriations Committee.”

Will Smith hails from Beattyville, Kentucky and has served Congressman Rogers for over 12 years. Serving as his Chief of Staff for the past 8 years, Smith now joins the Appropriations Committee has Deputy Staff Director.

Michael R. Higdon has served as Rogers’ chief liaison to the Appropriations Committee and Legislative Director overseeing the congressman’s expansive legislative portfolio. Higdon joined the Rogers’ staff in 2002 after serving a series of legislative terms with Congressman Roscoe Bartlett (R-MD) and former Congressman Ron Packard (R-CA). Higdon is an eleven-year veteran of Capitol Hill and a graduate of Lafayette College. He and his wife Jamie, currently residing in the District of Columbia, are active in their local church and will continue to make frequent trips to Kentucky to visit family.