January 2026 Policy Newsletter
“We never know the worth of water until the well is dry.”
Water in Crisis
If people are our city’s greatest asset, then our Water Division is possibly our second-greatest. It is the only publicly owned utility in the city, responsible for maintaining 1,300 miles of water mains, two treatment plants, two reservoirs, and 15,500 fire hydrants. The Water Division has been proudly publicly owned since 1835, and for almost 200 years, it has provided our City with a resource that is necessary to sustain all life. Its only source of funding is its ratepayers: the people of St. Louis who utilize our water to drink, clean, cook, and play.
On December 31st, I received a critical update from the Water Division addressed to me as the chair of the Public Infrastructure and Utilities Committee. Mayor Spencer and her Chief Operating Officer Ben Jonsson were also copied. The letter warned that the Water Division’s contingency fund, the fund they use for emergency repairs, was projected to be $8 million in the red by the end of the fiscal year on June 30th. They outlined many challenges, from insufficient rates to aging infrastructure, and they asked for help in addressing the need for a diverse funding stack to alleviate these issues.
I acted immediately to schedule a Public Infrastructure and Utilities Committee meeting for January 14th, where the Water Division presented in great detail the challenges that they are facing. The presentation is lengthy, full of details, and worth watching to get a clear-eyed understanding of the situation our Water Division faces today.
The Water Division’s financial woes boil down to an ongoing budget deficit that has existed for the past seven years, resulting in the impending depletion of its contingency fund. The main causes of the deficit are stagnant rates, the five year moratorium on water shut-offs, rising operating costs, and rising emergency costs combined with deferred capital renewal.
Insufficient rates
Because they are an Enterprise fund, meaning their revenue comes from ratepayers, the Water Division has become more difficult to manage over the decades as the city has lost population and the rates have remained the same. The Water Division does not get money from the general revenue fund, property taxes or sales taxes, so with fewer people in the city paying the rates, expenditures have outpaced revenues.
Today and for the past several decades, the people of St. Louis have received a fantastic deal on our water. We get clean, safe drinking water for a flat rate that remains the lowest in the region and one of the lowest in the country. While rates kept up with expenses before the pandemic, they became permanently unpaired in 2020, with expenditures outpacing revenues. Even after the two 20% rate increases that went into effect in mid 2023 and early 2024, and the inflation adjustment that went with them, costs have continued to rise. The Water Division is pursuing a rate sufficiency study to correct this, but that is a long process that is scheduled to conclude sometime in March. At the Board of Aldermen, we are committed to having a transparent public process surrounding any potential rate increase, but a rate increase alone will not solve this crisis.
The Moratorium
In 2020, the pandemic caused a loss of income for many people. A moratorium was put in place to stop water shut-offs during a period where many were stuck at home. But even after the pandemic ended, the moratorium stayed in place. It was not lifted until last year, five years later. There are now 16,879 delinquent accounts, resulting in $14 million worth of missing revenue for the Water Division.
Rising operating costs
As inflation has taken its toll on every family, costs continue to rise for the Water Division too. Whether it is staffing, contracting, or treatment chemicals, the cost of delivering safe, clean water has gone up. Staffing costs more these days, so to retain talent and bring back knowledgeable employees, the Water Division has worked with the Personnel Department to raise salaries. With the rising salaries comes increased fringe benefits. When emergencies happen, contractors are used, and those costs have increased too. In addition to people who help keep our water flowing, total chemical costs have gone up by 152% since 2018. Without sufficient rates, our Water Division is struggling to keep up.
Aging infrastructure
Our water infrastructure is old. Expensive repairs are constantly needed, especially when things break, which is often these days. In 2025, we had 399 water main breaks across the city, the most in seven years. Currently, the Water Division’s rates do not fund capital renewal, so without money to replace pipes, our old infrastructure will keep breaking, disrupting water flow for residents and businesses across the city, causing an economic toll in addition to the inconvenience. We can save money by replacing old pipes through capital projects, reducing breaks and the need for expensive repairs, but we need to allocate the money to do that.
At the end of the day it is the responsibility of our City to take care of our only publicly-owned utility. The Water Division needs saving, and only the Board of Aldermen can act to save it.
That is why I have been pushing to spend Rams Settlement money, or any money to fund the Water Division and ensure the continued delivery of safe, clean drinking water to all of our residents. Already this year, water main breaks have rendered some neighborhoods without water for days. A couple weeks ago, I started talking to my colleagues at the Board about a potential bill to spend Rams Settlement funds, but there is not an appetite among our leaders to spend that money at this time. However, upon discussion with the Mayor’s Office, money has been identified from a few sources to help the Water Division in the short-term, but it will not be enough to set them on a track of financial stability. Further action will be required, and soon.
Meanwhile, the Water Division is ready to get to work, identifying 63 water mains and 2 pumps that are in critical need of replacement. The average age of these pipes is 89 years old. Their replacement would prevent imminent breaks, stimulate our local economy, and save our City money.
The time to invest in water infrastructure is now. We had almost $500 million in American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) money a few years ago, and only $1.2 million went to water infrastructure. The rest went to other causes, many of them good, like the current Zoning Upgrade (ZOUP!), repaving and traffic calming on major streets like Kingshighway, and necessary investments in our City’s Health Department at the time of a major pandemic. But the Water Division was impacted by the pandemic too, and it is time to stop neglecting our water infrastructure. Pipes are breaking everywhere we have them, affecting the whole City from north to south, east to west, in every ward where every resident lives. When a water main breaks, entire neighborhoods, residents and businesses, must go without water or go under a boil order. When we keep telling the Water Division to wait, and then we have the most breaks we’ve had in seven years, it is not time to wait anymore.
If we care about the survival of our city, then we must acknowledge the dire position of the Water Division. The source of future funding is negotiable, but the amount must be significant enough to address critical infrastructure needs, provide emergency funds, and position the Water Division for ongoing capital renewal needs. It is up to all of us to figure this out and piece together whatever funding sources we can to save the Water Division today, and make this necessary investment into our future.
We find ourselves at the end of the road. There is no more room to kick the can.
ICE
I have struggled to find the right tone as we watch tragedy after tragedy unfold at the hands of federal agents in Minnesota and beyond. The America that I grew up with was never perfect, but there was a time when it felt like it was on a path of progress.
When you look at our history, America has never had a perfect, golden age. Though our Constitution has been amended, the words that dehumanized and enslaved people are still buried within its text. But throughout our history, people have used their rights to fight, ending institutional slavery, winning universal suffrage, civil rights, LGBTQIA+ rights, and more. America has never been perfect, but it has always embodied the potential for progress. Now it threatens to move backwards to an ugly place where we fear our neighbors, slander our citizens, and execute people in the street.
ICE, which stands for Immigration and Customs Enforcement, have become the brownshirts of Donald Trump’s America. It is a force consisting of poorly trained, barely-vetted agents, some of whom attempted insurrection on January 6th, 2021 and were subsequently pardoned by the man who inspired that insurrection. They dishonor law enforcement through their reckless actions, disgusting comments, and lack of discipline. And the administration that sent them to Minneapolis to sow seeds of terror has been lightning-quick to malign and slander anyone who questions their authority to terrorize and brutalize people in our city streets, naming those who are exercising their first amendment rights as domestic terrorists, justifying their deaths and lying to us about what we can see with our own eyes, as has been the case with Renee Good and Alex Pretti.
I would say this is not who we are as America, but it is exactly who we are at this moment. It is up to us to change it. I was twelve years old when September 11th happened, and my political awareness grew from that day forward to watch the weakening of our civil rights, the expansion of the surveillance and police states, and the creation of the Department of Homeland Security which now contains the tools of a despot, ICE. It is not enough to stop this madness, we must have accountability for us to move forward. Those who killed Renee Good and Alex Pretti must be brought to justice. There are dozens more who have died while in ICE custody, or suffered by their hands. We must examine our institutions, abolish the oppressive elements, and reform the rest. We must push away our fear, don our bravest faces, and insist on what makes America actually great.
Our best moments have come when we have worked together, created strength through diversity, and stood for each other instead of standing apart. We have always been a country of immigrants. The color of your skin, your accent, and your name are not pretext for illegal stops and searches or for detainment without cause. In America, we have the right to demonstrate and protest peacefully, and when someone is killed because they had a gun, as they were legally entitled to have under the 2nd Amendment, we should all question if the greater threat to ICE in that moment was not the gun that remained holstered, but the phone in Alex’s hand that sought to document their abuses.
This is an inflection point. The administration is lying to you, and you can verify that with your own eyes. Just imagine what they are lying about when there isn’t video evidence. Conservative, liberal, socialist, libertarian; we should all value the truth.
What can you do?
Get to know your neighbors
Get Involved
Go to your local neighborhood meetings, political meetings, and protests
Volunteer, walk into more places and ask “how can I help?”
Learn from experts
Work with organizations that are already doing the work:
MICA (Migrant and Immigrant Community Action Project) offers training, and along with other immigrant and community groups, offers the Rapid Response Hotline for reporting ICE activity. It is really important to use this hotline instead of spreading unverified rumors that may cause panic and confusion. We cannot live in fear, we must advocate for each other’s humanity, and it is never too late to join with your community and fight for the better future that we know America can have. It just takes work to get there, and it takes those who are willing to fight for it.
Conclusion
Thanks for taking the plunge into a challenging discussion about the state of our water infrastructure, and ICE overreach across our nation. As always, you can reach me at BrowningM@StLouis-MO.gov for anything government related, and MBrowningSTL@gmail.com for anything campaign related.
