Despite notable victories in City Halls and ballot boxes, the push to privatize public water and sewer systems remains steady, as we pointed out in our 2024 report,  Water Wars in Pennsylvania: How Corporations Play the Long Game. Private water interests work their way around and through state legislation, state utility and service commissions, and local regulations to provide the most favorable conditions to expand their footprint. And now they’re working it at the federal level.

The Clean Water SRF Parity Act of 2025 would let large for-profit wastewater corporations take funding away from local and small wastewater systems by allowing these corporations access to the Clean Water State Revolving Fund (SRF). 

In the Public Interest is among the more than 100 organizations that have signed on to a letter urging the rejection of the legislation. Organizations have until Monday, October 20, 2025, to add their names to the list.

“This legislation would grease the wheels on those privatizations by taking money away from local governments and in effect starving them of resources, and because money is fungible, it would free up other capital for corporations to privatize municipal systems,” the letter reads in part. It also points to a 2022 study found that “private ownership is the single biggest factor in higher drinking water rates among large systems, playing a larger role than aging infrastructure or drought.”

Who controls our water can maintain a great deal of control over our communities. That’s why we believe the communities must always have control of the water.