Texas SFY26 Public Comments: Drinking Water State Revolving Fund General Activities Intended Use Plan

To fully understand Texas’ drinking water challenges, it is essential to consider how different water system characteristics affect access to safe, affordable service—including the complex ways these characteristics interact to compound impacts on communities. While significant data exist regarding water systems and community conditions, these data are often fragmented across multiple platforms (government agencies, nonprofits, private entities) and rarely organized by utility service area boundaries—limiting accessibility for both decision-makers and advocates. EPIC aims to close this gap through two complementary efforts: (1) the new Texas Community Water System Prioritization Tool and (2) our ongoing Funding Tracker analysis of DWSRF Intended Use Plans (IUPs). The Prioritization Tool consolidates 50 variables from 11 datasets across 6 organizations and agencies—ranging from EPA’s Safe Drinking Water Information System and SRF awards, to TCEQ boil water notices, Census socioeconomic data, Duke University’s Water Affordability Dashboard, EDF’s Climate Vulnerability Index, and CEQ’s Climate and Economic Justice Screening Tool. This publicly available tool makes data accessible at the service-area level to support more equitable decision-making for investments in technical assistance, project funding, and education.