Central Arkansas Water: Watershed Protection Fee

Central Arkansas Water: Watershed Protection Fee

Central Arkansas Water is a metropolitan water system that serves a population of approximately 450,000. The utility has 125,000 residential, commercial, industrial, and master-metered customers in Pulaski, Saline, and Grant counties, and its service boundaries include the cities and communities of Little Rock, North Little Rock, Alexander, and College Station, among others. Lake Maumelle and Lake Winona provide drinking water to Central Arkansas Water customers and the utility governs and manages the two lakes and identifies source water protection as a top priority. Accordingly, the utility’s management program consists of measures to protect the two lakes from sediment, pollution, and other sources of possible contamination that could affect the quality of our drinking water, which are set out in the Lake Maumelle Watershed Management Plan adopted by the utility’s board of directors in 2007.

These programs are funded, in part, by Central Arkansas Water’s “watershed protection fee,” which is billed on a monthly basis and depends on the customer’s meter size. Central Arkansas Water uses the bonds backed by revenues generated by its watershed protection fee to purchase land in the Lake Maumelle Watershed to protect it from development.