Preview: Drinking Water State Revolving Fund Funding Tracker—Already Making an Impact
At EPIC, we’ve been working on developing a Drinking Water State Revolving Fund (SRF) Funding Tracker that brings much-needed clarity and analysis to the complex world of Intended Use Plans (IUPs), which outline how states intend to spend federal SRF funds each year, Project Priority Lists (PPLs), which rank eligible projects for potential funding, and funding awards. Designed with accessibility and usability in mind, the Funding Tracker will feature built-in analytics and state-level insights to help advocates, utilities, and policymakers navigate DWSRF policies and outcomes.
Even ahead of its public release, the Tracker is already proving valuable. As we continue to build out the tool, public comment periods on SRFs are opening, and we've put the Tracker to work by developing our own comments in Louisiana and Tennessee, and supporting partners in drafting comments in states like Texas and New York. In each case, the Tracker is helping us advance transparency and provide recommendations to improve the distribution of federal water infrastructure funding.
In our Tennessee comments, we were able to show—using Tracker analytics—that there is over $87 million in unmet demand for the Lead (Image 1) and Emerging Contaminants (EC) (Image 2) programs under the State Fiscal Year (SFY) 2025 IUPs. Showcasing this unmet demand supported our recommendation that the state consider leveraging its program in order to provide more support to communities through its SRF program.
Image 1: EPIC analysis on demand versus funds available for projects under the LSL SRF program
Image 2: EPIC analysis on demand versus funds available for projects under the EC DWSRF program
Through our tool, we can compare this to other states like Texas that significantly increased the amount of funds available for projects in the state through leveraging.
Image 3: Amount of funds available for Texas’ SRF program through leveraging
In Texas, from SFY 2023 through SFY 2025—the first three years of Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (IIJA) funding—our Tracker shows that Texas leveraged $717,514,716 to finance projects—which brought in more dollars than the $624,365,000 in Base and IIJA Gen Supp federal capitalization grants Texas drew down during the same time. Highlighting successful practices like these allows us to identify and elevate successful strategies that other states may adapt to maximize their own funding capacity.
See our Tennessee public comments to also see how we utilized set-aside analytics from our Tracker—another example of how our tool can highlight areas for states to improve overall SRF program efficiency.
In addition to this resource, interested audiences can review our SRF policy briefs, which dive into many of the key policy decisions examined in our Tracker analysis.
Once released, this tool will cover 15 focus states and offer detailed data and analysis on program demand, funding allocations, support for state-defined disadvantaged communities, use of set-asides, and more. It’s a preview of the kind of insights and program analysis we believe should be standard—and we’re just getting started!