DOI: 10.5061/dryad.w0vt4b932
title: Linking variation in water democracy to system performance on the human right to water

description: While scholars regularly associate fragmentation with drinking water
 disparities, here we consider the potential role of another consequence:
 variable levels of water democracy. We characterize voter enfranchisement
 across 2,405 California water systems and evaluate their performance with
 respect to three tenants of the Human Right to Water: access to safe,
 affordable, and accessible drinking water. Most systems limit
 enfranchisement beyond U.S. government election standards. Systems with
 enfranchisement limited to property owners are more likely to be at risk
 for unaffordability. Systems with no residential enfranchisement, located
 in the poorest communities with higher proportions of African Americans,
 are far more likely to rely on a single water source. The results
 highlight associations between water democracy and affordable, accessible
 drinking water with uneven impacts across the population. Understanding
 the role of governance in shaping inequities is essential for designing
 effective interventions to advance environmental justice.
description: # Linking variation in water democracy to system performance on the human
 right to water
 [https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.w0vt4b932](https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.w0vt4b932) ## Description of the data and file structure Data sources and compilation are documented at [https://github.com/kkdobbin/votingrights_systemperformance](https://github.com/kkdobbin/votingrights_systemperformance) ### Files and variables #### File: Waterdemocracy_systemperformance_finaldata_dryad_Sept15.csv **Description:** Full data set analyzed in the Nature Water publication by the same name with demographic variables removed due to Dryad concerns about privacy. See below for information on how to replicate those fields. Below each variable is described and the original source is then provided parenthetically. Links to data sources at the end of the README. Variables without a parenthetical source are derivatives of other variables in the dataset.  All missing data represented as NA. ##### Variables 1. PWSID: Public water system ID (SDWIS) 2. PWS_Name: Public water system name (SDWIS) 3. Primacy_FINAL: Responsible primacy agency (Dobbin, Fencl & McBride, 2023) 4. Final_inst_update: Institutional type (Dobbin, Fencl & McBride, 2023) 5. Inst_Subtype: Institutional subtype (Dobbin, Fencl & McBride, 2023) 6. Residential: Whether system served a residential population (author created, see code) 7. public: Whether system is governmentally owned/operated (author created, see code) 8. enfranchisement: Enfranchisement level for all systems except variable systems (author created, see code) 9. Variablecoded: Enfranchisement level for systems coded individually (author created, see manuscript) 10. enfranchisement_final: Combined final enfranchisement level for all systems, 3 level factor (author created, see manuscript) 11. Changed_enfranchisement: Whether enfranchisement level has changed since 2018 (author created, see manuscript) 12. SERVICE_CONNECTIONS: The service connections is the number of connections served by the water system (2024 Drinking Water Needs Assessment) 13. POPULATION: The number of people served by the water system (2024 Drinking Water Needs Assessment) 14. MHI: “Median household income” or “MHI” means the household income that represents the median or middle value for the community. The methods utilized for calculating median household income are included in Appendix A and Appendix E. Median household incomes in this document are estimated values for the purposes of this statewide assessment. Median household income for determination of funding eligibility is completed on a system-by-system basis by the State Water Board’s Division of Financial Assistance (2024 Drinking Water Needs Assessment) 15. CALENVIRO_SCREEN_SCORE: CalEnviroScreen uses a suite of indicators to characterize pollution burden and population characteristics. Each indicator is assigned a score for each census tract in the state based on the most up-to-date suitable data. Scores are weighted and added together within the two groups to derive a pollution burden score and a population characteristics score. Those scores are multiplied to give the final CalEnviroScreen score. An area with a high score is one that experiences a much higher pollution burden than areas with low scores (2024 Drinking Water Needs Assessment) 16. FINAL_SAFER_STATUS: Indicates the current SAFER status of a water system: Failing, At-Risk; Potentially At-Risk; and Not At-Risk (2024 Drinking Water Needs Assessment) 17. HOUSEHOLD_SOCIOECONOMIC_BURDEN_RAW_SCORE: The purpose of this risk indicator is to identify water systems that serve communities that have both high levels of poverty and high housing costs for low-income households. These communities may be struggling to pay their current water bill and may have a difficult time shouldering future customer charge increases when their limited disposable income is constrained by high housing costs. This indicator is a composite indicator of two data points: Poverty Prevalence and Housing Burden. Poverty Prevalence Indicator (PPI) measures the percent of the population living below two times the federal poverty level and can be represented reliably at the census block group, tract, and county level. Housing Burden Indicator measures the percent of households in a census tract that are both low income (making less than 80% of the Housing and Urban Development (HUD) Area Median Family Income) and severely burdened by housing costs (paying greater than 50% of their income to housing costs) (2024 Drinking Water Needs Assessment) 18. FUNDING_RECEIVED_SINCE_2017: Total construction and planning funding provided by the State Water Board to the water system since 2017 (2024 Drinking Water Needs Assessment) 19. PRIMARY_MCL_VIOLATION: Indicates if a water system is currently meeting the failing criteria for primary MCL violations (2024 Drinking Water Needs Assessment) 20. SECONDARY_MCL_VIOLATION: Indicates if a water system is currently meeting the failing criteria for secondary MCL violations (2024 Drinking Water Needs Assessment) 21. E_COLI_VIOLATION: Indicates if a water system is currently meeting the failing criteria for E. Coli violations (2024 Drinking Water Needs Assessment) 22. TREATMENT_TECHNIQUE_VIOLATION: Indicates if a water system is currently meeting the failing criteria for treatment technique violations (2024 Drinking Water Needs Assessment) 23. MONITORING_AND_REPORTING_VIOLATION: Indicates if a water system is currently meeting the failing criteria for Monitoring & Reporting violations (2024 Drinking Water Needs Assessment) 24. HISTORY_OF_E_COLI_PRESENCE_RISK_LEVEL: Indicates the risk level, based on threshold met, for the 'History of E.coli Presence' risk indicator (2024 Drinking Water Needs Assessment) 25. TREATMENT_TECHNIUQE_VIOLATIONS_RISK_LEVEL: Indicates the risk level, based on threshold met, for the 'Treatment Technique Violations' risk indicator (2024 Drinking Water Needs Assessment) 26. PERCENTAGE_OF_SOURCES_EXCEEDING_AN_MCL_RISK_LEVEL: Indicates the risk level, based on threshold met, for the 'Percentage of Sourced Exceeding an MCL' risk indicator (2024 Drinking Water Needs Assessment) 27. CONSTITUENTS_OF_EMERGING_CONCERN_RISK_LEVEL: Indicates the risk level, based on threshold met, for the 'Constituents of Emerging Concern' risk indicator (2024 Drinking Water Needs Assessment) 28. NUMBER_OF_WATER_SOURCES_RISK_LEVEL: Indicates the risk level, based on threshold met, for the 'Number of Water Sources' risk indicator (2024 Drinking Water Needs Assessment) 29. ABESENCE_OF_INTERTIES_RISK_LEVEL: Indicates the risk level, based on threshold met, for the 'Constituents of Emerging Concern' risk indicator (2024 Drinking Water Needs Assessment) 30. BOTTLED_WATER_OR_HAULED_WATER_RELIANCE_RISK_LEVEL: Indicates the risk level, based on threshold met, for the 'Bottled Water or Hauled Water Reliance' risk indicator (2024 Drinking Water Needs Assessment) 31. SOURCE_CAPACITY_VIOLATION_RISK_LEVEL: Indicates if a water system is currently meeting the failing criteria for Source Capacity & Water Outage violations (2024 Drinking Water Needs Assessment) 32. PERCENT_OF_MEDIAN_HOUSEHOLD_INCOME_MHI_RISK_LEVEL: Indicates the risk level, based on threshold met, for the 'Percent of Median Household Income (%MHI)' risk indicator (2024 Drinking Water Needs Assessment) 33. EXTREME_WATER_BILL_RISK_LEVEL: Indicates the risk level, based on threshold met, for the 'Percent of Median Household Income (%MHI)' risk indicator (2024 Drinking Water Needs Assessment) 34. OPERATOR_CERTIFICATION_VIOLATIONS_RISK_LEVEL: Indicates the risk level, based on threshold met, for the 'operator certification violations' risk indicator (2024 Drinking Water Needs Assessment) 35. MONITORING_AND_REPORTING_VIOLATIONS_RISK_LEVEL: Indicates the risk level, based on threshold met, for the 'monitoring and reporting violations' risk indicator (2024 Drinking Water Needs Assessment) 36. DAYS_CASH_ON_HAND_RISK_LEVEL: Indicates the risk level, based on threshold met, for the 'days cash on hand' risk indicator (2024 Drinking Water Needs Assessment) 37. OPERATING_RATIO_RISK_LEVEL: Indicates the risk level, based on threshold met, for the 'operating ratio' risk indicator (2024 Drinking Water Needs Assessment) 38. Intend.to.apply: Whether water system reported in a survey to the State Water Resources Control Board that they intended to apply for the drinking water arrearage relief program (SWRCB arrearage program) 39. Application.complete: Whether water system applied for the drinking water arrearage relief program (SWRCB arrearage program) 40. Type: Water system type (SDWIS) 41. Principal.County.Served: County located (SDWIS) 42. Primary.Source.Water.Type: Primary water source (SDWIS) 43. Source: Whether water is sourced from groundwater or surface water based on primary source water type 44. Purchased: Whether water is self-produced or purchased based on primary source water type variable 45. LN_POP: Natural log of the population served variable 46. PERCENT_OF_MEDIAN_HOUSEHOLD_INCOME_MHI_RISK_LEVEL_BI: Reformatted version of the original needs assessment variable to get rid of middle factor level  47. EXTREME_WATER_BILL_RISK_LEVEL_BI: Reformatted version of the needs assessment variable to get rid of middle factor level  48. FUNDING_any: Whether system has received any state funding since 2018 (2024 Drinking Water Needs Assessment) 49. FUNDING_any_failingoratriskonly: Whether system has received any state funding since 2018 with NAs for any system that is not classifed by the needs assessment as failing or at risk  50. NUMBER_OF_WATER_SOURCES_RISK_LEVEL_BI: Reformatted version of the original needs assessment variable to get rid of middle factor level  51. hasnotreceivedfunding: Whether system has not received any funding since 2018 52. didnotapplycovid: Whether a system did not apply for COVID arrearage relief 53. SC3i_Count_Distribution: Count of distributional disruptions in 2023 (DWR small water system water shortage vulnerability assessment) 54. Service_disruptions: Binary indicator of whether a system had one or more distributional disruptions in 2023 based on SC3i_County_Distribution 55. FAILING: Whether system is considered failing by the Needs Assessment (2024 Drinking Water Needs Assessment) 56. Percent.hispanicorlatino: Percent of service area that is Hispanic or Latino calculated using 2022 ACS and areal weighting (author created, see code) 57. Percent.white: Percent of service area that is non-Hispanic white calculated using 2022 ACS and areal weighting (author created, see code) 58. Percent.black: Percent of service area that is African American calculated using 2022 ACS and areal weighting (author created, see code) 59. Percent.asian: Percent of service area that is Asian calculated using 2022 ACS and areal weighting (author created, see code) 60. Percent.renter: Percent of households in service area that are renter occupied calculated using 2022 ACS and areal weighting (author created, see code) ## Code/software R Version 2024.09.1+394 ## Access information Other publicly accessible locations of the data: * [https://github.com/kkdobbin/votingrights_systemperformance](https://github.com/kkdobbin/votingrights_systemperformance) Data was derived from the following sources: * California Safe Drinking Water Information System (SDWIS) from [https://sdwis.waterboards.ca.gov/PDWW/](https://sdwis.waterboards.ca.gov/PDWW/) * 2024 Drinking Water Needs Assessment from [https://www.waterboards.ca.gov/drinking_water/certlic/drinkingwater/needs.html](https://www.waterboards.ca.gov/drinking_water/certlic/drinkingwater/needs.html) * System Area Boundary Layer (SABL) from [https://gispublic.waterboards.ca.gov/portal/apps/webappviewer/index.html?id=272351aa7db14435989647a86e6d3ad8](https://gispublic.waterboards.ca.gov/portal/apps/webappviewer/index.html?id=272351aa7db14435989647a86e6d3ad8) * Dobbin, Kristin; Fencl, Amanda; McBride, Justin (2023). 2023 California Community Water System institutional type update [Dataset]. Dryad. [https://doi.org/10.25338/B8KP92](https://doi.org/10.25338/B8KP92) * State Water Resources Control Board (SWRCB). (2022). Original Water Arrearage Program list of water system applications from January 19, 2022. [https://www.waterboards.ca.gov/arrearage_payment_program/](https://www.waterboards.ca.gov/arrearage_payment_program/)  * Department of Water Resources (DWR). (2024). Small Water System Water Shortage Vulnerability Assessment. [https://data.cnra.ca.gov/dataset/water-shortage-vulnerability-technical-methods/resource/090baaf3-dc47-4e21-8eba-d9bf499a76a0](https://data.cnra.ca.gov/dataset/water-shortage-vulnerability-technical-methods/resource/090baaf3-dc47-4e21-8eba-d9bf499a76a0)