We appreciate the letter, and the opportunity to work with Mayor Bowser and the District on this important issue.
We are implementing a $2.7 billion program that will dramatically improve water quality in the Potomac and Anacostia Rivers and Rock Creek. The Clean Rivers Project was court-mandated by a consent decree signed by DC Water, The District, U.S. EPA and the U.S. Department of Justice. The project is paid for through the Impervious Area Charge. We know the burden that this charge places on our customers, and are doing all that we can to deliver the project and minimize the impact. All contracts are competitively bid, we are structuring debt service costs in a way to lower costs for today’s customers, and we are working to train and employee District residents to do this work. We are also delivering on our commitment: this week marks the completion of the first phase of the project, a seven-mile long tunnel from RFK Stadium to Blue Plains to reduce combined sewer overflows to the Anacostia River by 80 percent.
We work every day to provide safe drinking water to our customers and to collect and treat it after it is used. Our aging infrastructure is expensive to maintain, and we simultaneously invest in repairing and renewing it so that all 700,000 residents of the District of Columbia have safe drinking water and rivers where the water quality is improving.
We will continue to work with our customers, our Board, the Mayor and the DC Council to ensure that we deliver our services as efficiently as possible, and at the lowest cost that we can, to all of those who depend on us for clean water.
