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Portland Borough's Wellhead Protection ProgramThe Portland Borough Authority operates a public water system that provides water service to approximately 435 customers within the Borough of Portland and Village of Slateford in Upper Mount Bethel Township, Northampton County, Pennsylvania (Figure 1). Water is conveyed to the customers by gravity transmission lines from three wells located on the side of Kittatinny Mountain. The purpose of this project is to identify where the water that is pumped from these wells comes from and put in place management and educational programs that will protect the water supply areas from contamination. Stewardship of these areas is crucial for insuring adequate water quality and quantity for us and for generations to come.
Proactively protecting water supplies from contamination rather than simply responding to expensive, time consuming, and potentially dangerous contamination events is recognized world wide as the most prudent action. This approach to water resource management is subscribed to at the national level in section 1428 of the Federal Safe Drinking Water Act which requires States to develop programs to protect ground water sources used by public water systems from contamination. The Commonwealth of Pennsylvania developed a Wellhead Protection Program that was approved by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency in 1999. The Commonwealth has recently integrated its wellhead protection program into a program that is aimed at protecting both surface and ground water sources used by public water systems. The program is referred to as the Source Water Assessment and Protection Program. The wellhead protection program described in this report was supported by a Source Water Protection Program Grant from the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection awarded to the Portland Borough Authority in 2002. The efficacy of this wellhead protection program depends on a long-term, largely voluntary commitment by municipal officials and private individuals to resource management. The areas that supply water to the three Portland Borough Authority wells were carefully delineated and, based on detailed examination of land use, management tools have been developed for protecting the wellhead protection areas. A sustained awareness of the areas to be protected and the tools available for protecting them will be the key to the success of this program. What can you do to help?
Portland Borough's Wellhead Protection Program ReportThis report was prepared by:
R.K.R. Hess Associates, INC. Surveyors, Planners, Engineers, and Environmentalists 112 North Courtland Street P.O. Box 268 East Stroudsburg, PA 18301 Phone: 570-421-1550 Fax: 570-421-6720
View the complete report by following this link (PDF document, 1.6 MB). You will need Adobe Acrobat Reader to view this file, if you do not have this installed, click the image below to obtain your free copy of this software.
View the report by section by selecting the links from the following outline:
AcknowledgementsThis project was supported by a Source Water Protection Program grant from the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection awarded to the Portland Borough Authority and by in-kind services provided by the Portland Borough Authority and Keystone College.
This brochure has been funded by the League of Women Voters of Pennsylvania Citizen Education Fund under a grant from the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection.
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