Two halves, and the first is the one most descriptions of this work leave out. A utility’s own records are usually the harder and more valuable side: they are in a billing system nobody has queried in years, a folder of PDFs, and a spreadsheet one person maintains. Public data is the half that is merely tedious.
Named as documents rather than as systems throughout. Naming a system would promise a connector that does not exist.
Your internal records
- Billing and consumption exports
- Audited financial statements
- Capital plan and prior rate study
- Meter, production and flow logs
- Council and board packets
State agency publications
- Water loss filings
- Drinking water violations and enforcement
- Funding priority and award lists
- Rate ordinances and tariffs
Federal and other sources
- Household income and demographics
- Federal drinking water databases
- Lead service line inventories
- PFAS occurrence under UCMR5
- Filings held by other agencies