Notices

DATE: July 10, 1997
TO: All East Cocalico Township Authority Water Customers
(Original Notice issued July 19, 1993)

East Cocalico Township officials are dedicated to supplying the quantity and quality of public water needed to service the customer base. Therefore, you are encouraged to practice water conservation whenever possible. Everyone must be ever mindful of the need to conserve this precious natural resource.

In line with conservation efforts, the Authority Board has placed a permanent ban on watering of lawns. To quote the ruling we provide the following: "In an effort to promote water conservation in East Cocalico Township, all watering of existing, established lawns has been permanently banned."  The only exception is the watering of newly-seeded lawns. These lawns are only allowed to be watered during the growing season of the year in which seeding has occurred.  Property owners and residents are asked to cooperate fully by adhering to compliance regulations at all times.  Please be advised that penalties for violating this ruling are as follows:

Any Water Consumer found using water in violation of any resolution adopted by the Authority shall:

• First Offense - Be warned of the violation and immediately comply with the terms.
• Second Offense - Be billed two times the consumer's quarterly water billing for actual use for quarter in which offense occurred.
• Third Offense - Will be billed four times the consumer's quarterly water billing for actual use for quarter in which offense occurred.

Water conservation is vitally important. We ask you to practice voluntary conservation measures in all aspects of your water usage, and to dutifully respect the required ban on watering lawns other than newly-seeded areas. Your dedicated conservation efforts will help to maintain quantities of water available for your use and for fellow East Cocalico customers. Thank you very much for your complete cooperation to these ends.

** This permanent ban on watering of all existing, established lawns is also part of the Rates, Rules & Regulations of the ECTA Water System, Section XVII.D.

There are no special meetings scheduled for the Water & Sewer Authority.

On April 28, 2018, the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection published changes to their Chapter 109 Safe Drinking Water Regulations specifically related to disinfection requirements. The East Cocalico Township Authority uses chlorine gas as a disinfectant in its water system. One of the significant provision changes with the new rule requires a 10-fold increase in the minimum disinfection (chlorine) residual measured throughout our water distribution system. The previous regulation called for a minimum of 0.02 mg/l of disinfectant residual in the water distribution system. The new regulation requires 0.2 mg/l. These new requirements apply not only to the East Cocalico Township Authority but to all community and non-community water systems throughout Pennsylvania.

By October 29, 2018, the Authority is required to develop and submit a plan to the PA DEP outlining how we will go about meeting the new disinfection requirements for our distribution system. By April 29, 2019, the Authority must meet these new standards.

The Authority and its engineers have begun the planning and cost analysis process. We have slowly increased chlorine dosages at our well sites in order to better meet the new requirements. Other items under consideration include the possibility of utilizing automatic flushing devices to keep water moving throughout the system (especially at dead end points), installing chlorine boosting stations at select locations and making use of mixing devices in one or more of our water tanks. Additional piping to loop dead ends in the water system will also be considered.

The Authority is fully committed to meeting the new disinfection requirements enacted by the PA DEP. As always, our primary mission is to act in the best interest of our customers to provide a sufficient, dependable and safe supply of water and sanitary sewer services, in the most cost-effective manner.

The full text of the revisions to the PA DEP Chapter 109 Safe Drinking Water Regulations can be found on the Pennsylvania Bulletin website. You can also contact Lisa Daniels, Director, Bureau of Safe Drinking Water at P. O. Box 8467, Rachel Carson State Office Building, Harrisburg, PA 17105-8467, (717) 787-9633 or email her with any questions or concerns you may have regarding the PA DEP's new regulations.

Click the link below to view a copy of the letter ECTA received from the PA DEP regarding these changes:

The Transparency in Coverage Rule issued by the federal government requires health insurers and group health plans to provide detailed pricing data for all covered items and services to the public in the form of Machine Readable Files (MRFs). The link below leads to the MRFs that are made available in response to the Rule and includes negotiated service rates and out-of-network allowed amounts between health plans and healthcare providers. The MRFs are formatted to allow researchers, regulators, and application developers to more easily access and analyze data. As required, these files will be available on July 1, 2022 and will be updated monthly.

Transparency in Coverage MRFs

Unregulated Contaminant Monitoring Rule (UCMR-5)