Water Conservation Best Management Practices for Public Water Supplies:

Conservation Outreach/Public Information Programs (click to download entire document)
Outdoor water used to maintain lawns and landscapes is the most significant non-essential water use and is one that involves residential, commercial, and municipal water users. Building public awareness of the limitations of local water supplies, and the consequences of overuse through public outreach is a key component of developing and implementing a drought or water shortage plan. A well- informed community will understand that overuse of water supplies will not only impact nearby ecosystems, but also threaten the availability of water for more essential purposes (such as drinking, or fire protection) and will respond more readily when asked to minimize non-essential water use. Public outreach should also appeal to the needs of different customer classes. For example, small business customers may require a different outreach strategy than residential customers with large landscapes.

Water Conservation Coordinator Position (click to download entire document)
Water conservation coordinators are professional positions commonly found in the West and other places frequently plagued with drought conditions. Here in New England, however, one would be hard pressed to find a water conservation coordinator – even in a large utility. For some communities this may represent a cost-effective solution to sound water resource management.

Conservation Pricing (click to download entire document)
Conservation rates and associated metering and billing practices are activities employed by water utilities with the intent of providing a price signal to reduce or minimize wasteful use of water resources and to reduce future costs to customers. Fundamental to this strategy is the idea that potable water is an extremely valuable and, in some cases, limited resource that should be protected and sustained over time.
The objective of this Best Management Practice is to provide a description of pricing practices available to water utilities to encourage consumers to minimize the wasteful or unnecessary consumption of potable water. Rate setting is one of many measures or practices that can be employed to encourage water conservation; however, rate changes should be viewed in the overall context of a water system’s plan to integrate both supply and demand side management techniques.