AWWA JAW41460

The five largest water utilities in Utah and the State Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ) formed the Utah Water Quality Alliance to strive to produce drinking water of the best quality. The alliance was designed to monitor both source water and treated water quality, optimize treatment processes, and evaluate new technologies to further reduce contaminants of concern. The alliance's activities fulfilled many of the criteria of a subsequently proposed national water quality enhancement program, the Partnership for Safe Water. Each utility has benefited from this multiagency and cooperative approach by opening communication lines, securing additional funding through the participation of the state DEQ, and sharing expertise to accomplish complex tasks such as tracer studies and extensive monitoring programs (e.g., the pre-Information Collection Rule study). Includes 18 references, tables, figures.