Ross & Associates Environmental Consulting, Ltd.

Ross & Associates has supported the United States Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) Office of Water, in collaboration with six national water sector associations, to define and promote the “Ten Attributes of Effectively Managed Water Sector Utilities.” EPA and the associations’ efforts began with defining a water sector strategy to promote greater adoption of effective management systems and other best practices by water and wastewater utilities. In support of strategy development, Ross & Associates facilitated stakeholder group meetings to define specific attributes of effectively managed utilities and related critical success factors, explore existing resources and programs, and identify barriers to implementation. The result was an outline that included the major components of a sector-wide strategy called Effective Water Utility Management (or EUM), including the “Ten Attributes of Effectively Managed Water Sector Utilities” (“Attributes”). To promote the Attributes, EPA and the water associations, with support from Ross & Associates, prepared the “Effective Utility Management: A Primer for Water and Wastewater Utilities” document. This primer describes the Attributes, articulates five “Keys to Management Success,” provides a self-assessment method for identifying management areas for priority attention, and provides a cohesive set of targeted, generally applicable, measures that individual utilities can use to monitor and measure their performance. EUM remains a high-profile EPA initiative with continuing emphasis placed on promoting the ten attributes and better enabling utilities to improve management across them. In this context, during 2012, EPA, with assistance from Ross & Associates, will conduct three EUM workshops with a focus on small water sector utility systems.