ENROLLED ORIGINAL
A RESOLUTION
23-450
IN THE COUNCIL OF THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA
July 7, 2020
To declare the sense of the Council that Congress should enact and fund a national water
affordability program, modeled on the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program
for home heating assistance for low-income families as a component of federal COVID-
19 relief.
RESOLVED, BY THE COUNCIL OF THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA, That this
resolution may be cited as the Sense of the Council for Supporting Congressional Approval of a
Federal Sustainable Water Affordability Program Resolution of 2020.
Sec. 2. The Council finds that:
(1) In May 2020, the Council advocated that DC Water, one of the largest
municipal water filtration systems in the United States, which serves the metropolitan
Washington, D.C. region, continue to provide District residential customers with full service
regardless of whether they have current or delinquent accounts. This includes reconnecting all
occupied residential properties with water service, which is strategic to addressing the personal
hygiene needs and health emergency requirements associated with the deadly impacts of the
COVID-19 pandemic.
(2) The need for a subsidy to support long-term, sustainable, and affordable
access to water and sewerage services will have enormous benefits toward the health of all who
reside in the District. A subsidy will be particularly beneficial to household members engaged in
service and hospitality trades, many of whom have lower incomes. As essential everyday
workers, these workers have the greatest medical risks, which frequently lead to serious illness or
death due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Accessing municipal water service must be addressed
with urgency through a national holistic solution of new policies that remove unaffordability for
financially challenged residents and small residential property owners and offer access to clean
affordable water service. The problem of unaffordability requires a permanent solution to
maintain the public health of the community.
(3) Congress should create and adequately fund a national water rates subsidy
program similar to the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program (LIHEAP) within the
U.S. Department of Health & Human Services.
(4) LIHEAP receives and expends approximately $3.5 billion annually to support
1
 ENROLLED ORIGINAL
gas and electric heating utility costs for low-income residents throughout the United States.
(5) Based on the same realities that led the federal government to recognize the
need to support low-income families by subsidizing energy, it is time to also provide a robust
federal subsidy for the precious resource of clean and safe drinking water.
(6) As the high cost of providing clean and safe drinking water, which is
experiencing an alarming rise in retail rates across the country, adversely affects municipalities
ability to provide free or subsidized water, the federal government is the proper entity to fund
necessary water subsidies for low-income families, as demonstrated by the popular and
successful LIHEAP.
(7) Affordable water is a health and safety issue that is implicitly recognized not
only by the recent reconnection of water services to aid in the mitigation of the COVID-19
pandemic, but also by the existence of LIHEAP for low-income electric and gas home heating.
Water also needs to be recognized and supported for our most vulnerable residents as a utility
that is directly tied to the support of life.
(8) Congress is presently deliberating another one or more tranches of relief
funding for expenses related to the COVID-19 pandemic. The funding of water and sewer
infrastructure should be included as a public health benefit.
Sec. 3. It is the sense of the Council that Congress should enact and fund a national water
affordability program, modeled on LIHEAP for home heating assistance for low-income families,
and that significant and adequate funding for a national water affordability program benefiting
low-income water customers and public health should be an urgent, primary focus of
congressional COVID-19 pandemic relief funding.
Sec. 4. The Council shall transmit a copy of this resolution to Mayor Muriel Bowser,
Delegate Eleanor Holmes Norton, Representatives Nancy Pelosi and Kevin McCarthy, Senators
Mitch McConnell and Charles Schumer, and Tommy Wells, Chair of the DC Water Board of
Directors.
Sec. 5. This resolution shall take effect immediately upon the first date of publication in
the District of Columbia Register.
2