Paul Tonko: “I thank the gentleman from Maryland for yielding. I rise in support of this bill. S. 611, the Grassroots Rural and Small…”

“I thank the gentleman from Maryland for yielding. I rise in support of this bill. S. 611, the Grassroots Rural and Small Community Water Systems Assistance Act, reauthorizes a small but important program that delivers technical assistance and training to our community water systems. I want to thank Representative Harper for introducing H.R. 2853, the House companion bill to Senator Wicker's bill, and I am proud to be a cosponsor of that legislation. I also want to thank Chairman Upton, our Ranking Member Pallone, Chairman Shimkus, and the Energy and Commerce staff for working with us on report language to clarify language in this bill so that we can indeed provide a wide range of technical assistance that would help small water systems, such as source water protection, system monitoring and efficiency, sustainability, and water security aspects. Many small and rural communities, with populations of 10,000 or less, face challenges in maintaining and upgrading aging water infrastructure. The ratepayer base for these small systems simply does not provide a sufficient operating budget to support full-time technical positions. Source water quality problems, resulting in system shutdowns and expensive treatment processes, are an increasing problem for far too many public water systems due to inadequate attention to nonpoint source pollution.…”