Old Water/New Water

• Author: Michael Curley
• Pages: 61-73

61

Chapter 8—Old Water/

New Water

Early on in this book, we discussed the fact that in the middle of the

20th century, the country and the world were just beginning to wake

up to t he problem of pollution in general, and water pollution, in

particular. At that time, urban se wage was the #1 cause of water pollution.

e United States nally got its act toget her in 1972 when the CWA

was pa ssed over the veto of President Nixon. e CWA contained a fund-

ing provision c alled t he construction grant program. It was to be adminis-

tered by EPA that had—oddly enough—been created by President Nixon

in December 1970 by executive order. Over the next 15 years, EPA handed

out over $70 billion of funds appropriated by Congress. ese grants were

made to local governments or authorities for sewer projects. ey required a

local match. So between the federal grants and the local matching funds, the

United States spent well over $100 billion controlling urban water pollution

between 1972 and 1987. And, as is often sa id, back in the 1970s and 1980s,

$100 billion was real money.

By 1987, EPA had noticed t hat the grants, or “free money,” had begot-

ten some unfortunate side eects. ese were overbuilding, “gilding” (using

unnecessarily expensive xtures), and dependency. Everyone wanted more.

Everyone wanted their Uncle Sam to take care of them. No more. And so, in

1987, Congress made a wholesale amendment to the CWA and replaced the

construction grant program with a loa n program called the CWSRF. is

program involved EPA’s awarding of grants to the states, but the states could

not pass on the g rants to the loca l governments and authorities. ey could

only lend them t he money. No grants; only loans. ere are other nancia l

powers that the CWSRFs have, like guaranties, purchase of local obligations,

and investments; but loans are the most popular.

In addition, in 1996, Congress enacted the Safe Drin king Water Act

(SDWA), which created the Drinking Water State Revolving Fund (DWSRF).

In the 50 states plus Puerto Rico, the DWSRF and the CWSR F are man-

aged by the same agencies. (Henceforth in this book, the CWSRF and the

DWSRF in the states will be collectively referred to as the SRFs.)