Can you even begin to imagine a day without water? It isn't just your personal use of water—brushing your teeth, flushing your toilet, or taking a shower. Water is also essential to public health and safety, as well as a functioning economy.
Today, EWEB joins elected officials, water utilities, community leaders, and businesses participating in the third annual Imagine a Day without Water, a nationwide day of education and advocacy about the value of water.
Here in Eugene, we're fortunate to have the McKenzie River as our community's drinking water source, but we must make significant investments in infrastructure to ensure continued safe, reliable delivery of water to homes and businesses.
Recognizing that investment in our drinking water systems is essential to health, safety, and economic prosperity, we invite customers to learn more about EWEB's Water Reliability Initiative at our Customer Open House, Tuesday, Oct. 17 from 5:30-7:30 p.m.
At the Open House, you can speak with EWEB managers, elected commissioners, and subject matter experts to learn about investments we're making to prepare, replace and maintain our community's water system. We will also have practical information on winter preparedness, energy and water efficiency incentives, and more.
It's easy to take drinking water for granted. We don't often think about what we can't see, like the infrastructure behind our taps: the treatment facility, water pipelines, pumps and storage reservoirs.
But here is no doubt about it—a day without water is a crisis.
We've identified several emergencies that could result in a water supply shortage: earthquake, drought, forest fire, flood, a chemical spill into the McKenzie River and a system or facility failure. Our Water Reliability Initiative includes projects to replace water mains, upgrade interties, upgrade or build new reservoirs amd add backup electrical power to pump stations so that we can respond and recover quickly to any type of emergency. We've invested more than $30 million over the past decade upgrading and expanding our filtration plant. We're also working on an emergency water distribution program that would include several permanent distribution sites located throughout the community.
We're joining with hundreds of groups across the country for Imagine a Day without Water because we want people to pay attention to our water systems. Access to clean water is a public health and safety issue. It is an economic issue. No community can thrive without water.
We hope to see you at the Oct. 17 Open House for an opportunity to highlight the critical importance of reliable access to clean water in our lives and the investment in infrastructure that is necessary to protect this valuable resource.
Tuesday, Oct. 17 from 5:30-7:30 p.m.
EWEB Headquarters 500 E. 4th Avenue (North Building)
Bring the kids for an interactive electrical safety demonstration. Door prizes and light refreshments offered.
Customers will also receive a 3-gallon emergency water container to take home, while supplies last.
4200 Roosevelt Blvd.
Eugene, OR 97402
800-841-5871
541-685-7000
Open Monday-Friday
Phone hours: 9 a.m. - 6:30 p.m.
