The Baltimore City Department of Public Works (DPW) is pleased to announce the release of its Annual Water Quality Report for 2014, which finds that the water provided to the department’s residential and commercial customers meets or exceeds regulatory standards.

 

“As the primary water supplier for the Baltimore region, it is DPW’s mission to provide our customers with pure, clean, and consistently great-tasting water,” said DPW Director Rudolph S. Chow, P.E.

 

Baltimore has both high-quality raw water supplies and dedicated professionals who work around-the-clock to ensure that the water provided to households and commercial customers is safe. The City performs 150,000 water quality tests annually and produces an average of 225 million gallons of drinking water daily. The water is analyzed for more than 90 different drinking water contaminants.

 

The Annual Water Quality Report notes that Baltimore uses surface water from rainfall and snowmelt as its water source. Baltimore City owns three raw-water reservoirs (Liberty, Prettyboy, and Loch Raven), which provide water to 1.8 million people in Baltimore City and five surrounding counties.

 

In addition, the report highlights the changes that DPW has made to improve customer support and services to its more than 400,000 water customers. DPW Customer Support and Services Division has increased staffing, added telephone lines, improved training, hired liaison officers, and added a correspondence unit.

 

The report is now available online and can be downloaded athttp://publicworks.baltimorecity.gov/. The Annual Water Quality Report will be included with water bills that are going out now.