Water security in North Carolina’s most economically insecure county: a case study
Negative health impacts of water insecurity are often felt most in poor and rural communities and communities of color, who are more likely to be underserved by water infrastructure and disproportionately subject to socioeconomic stressors. Despite mandated efforts to allocate significant federal re...
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
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IOP Publishing
2025-01-01
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| Series: | Environmental Research Letters |
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| Online Access: | https://doi.org/10.1088/1748-9326/ada4c2 |
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| author | Hana C Long Beverly Collins-Hall Kaelan Moore Bethany Cutts Jacqueline MacDonald Gibson |
| author_facet | Hana C Long Beverly Collins-Hall Kaelan Moore Bethany Cutts Jacqueline MacDonald Gibson |
| author_sort | Hana C Long |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | Negative health impacts of water insecurity are often felt most in poor and rural communities and communities of color, who are more likely to be underserved by water infrastructure and disproportionately subject to socioeconomic stressors. Despite mandated efforts to allocate significant federal resources to infrastructure funding in ‘disadvantaged communities,’ communities with the most need risk systematic exclusion from access to resources, decision-making structures, and even benefits of research intended to address inequitable infrastructure services and health outcomes in their own communities. This project aims to describe groundwork and preliminary findings from community-engaged environmental research conducted within an ongoing community-based participatory research partnership in Robeson County, NC, a majority–minority county with the lowest median household income of NC’s 100 counties. Semi-structured interviews conducted with community members were analyzed to identify concerns about drinking water security (including safety, affordability, and reliability), perceptions of water quality, averting behaviors taken due to water insecurity, and ideas for improving water security. Findings suggest that there is a high level of mistrust in community water supplies, with perceptions of poor water quality driving a reliance on bottled water. Those relying on private wells expressed greater trust in their water and lower reliance on bottled water. Concerns about affordability were less prominent than those about water quality. Insufficient water reliability (low flow) was mentioned by many respondents, including those with community water service and those relying on private wells. Most supported increasing taxes to improve water security and also recommended increasing communications between water service providers and the public to improve trust. Overall, this work suggests the need for a comprehensive assessment of the quality and reliability of community water services in Robeson County, interventions to address problems identified, and much more engagement with the community about identifying and allocating funding to solve water security problems. |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj-art-34c44ba65f2d4f43ad17b22f0b270095 |
| institution | Kabale University |
| issn | 1748-9326 |
| language | English |
| publishDate | 2025-01-01 |
| publisher | IOP Publishing |
| record_format | Article |
| series | Environmental Research Letters |
| spelling | doaj-art-34c44ba65f2d4f43ad17b22f0b2700952025-01-30T16:28:09ZengIOP PublishingEnvironmental Research Letters1748-93262025-01-0120202404710.1088/1748-9326/ada4c2Water security in North Carolina’s most economically insecure county: a case studyHana C Long0https://orcid.org/0000-0002-0363-3212Beverly Collins-Hall1Kaelan Moore2https://orcid.org/0009-0008-8394-3085Bethany Cutts3https://orcid.org/0000-0001-7879-526XJacqueline MacDonald Gibson4https://orcid.org/0000-0002-5468-0713Department of Civil, Construction, and Environmental Engineering, NC State University , Raleigh, NC, United States of AmericaAmerican Indian Mothers, Inc. , Red Springs, NC, United States of AmericaDepartment of Civil, Construction, and Environmental Engineering, NC State University , Raleigh, NC, United States of AmericaDepartment of Parks, Recreation and Tourism Management, NC State University , Raleigh, NC, United States of America; Center for Geospatial Analytics, NC State University , Raleigh, NC, United States of America; North Carolina Center for Coastal Algae, People and Environment , Raleigh, NC, United States of AmericaDepartment of Civil, Construction, and Environmental Engineering, NC State University , Raleigh, NC, United States of AmericaNegative health impacts of water insecurity are often felt most in poor and rural communities and communities of color, who are more likely to be underserved by water infrastructure and disproportionately subject to socioeconomic stressors. Despite mandated efforts to allocate significant federal resources to infrastructure funding in ‘disadvantaged communities,’ communities with the most need risk systematic exclusion from access to resources, decision-making structures, and even benefits of research intended to address inequitable infrastructure services and health outcomes in their own communities. This project aims to describe groundwork and preliminary findings from community-engaged environmental research conducted within an ongoing community-based participatory research partnership in Robeson County, NC, a majority–minority county with the lowest median household income of NC’s 100 counties. Semi-structured interviews conducted with community members were analyzed to identify concerns about drinking water security (including safety, affordability, and reliability), perceptions of water quality, averting behaviors taken due to water insecurity, and ideas for improving water security. Findings suggest that there is a high level of mistrust in community water supplies, with perceptions of poor water quality driving a reliance on bottled water. Those relying on private wells expressed greater trust in their water and lower reliance on bottled water. Concerns about affordability were less prominent than those about water quality. Insufficient water reliability (low flow) was mentioned by many respondents, including those with community water service and those relying on private wells. Most supported increasing taxes to improve water security and also recommended increasing communications between water service providers and the public to improve trust. Overall, this work suggests the need for a comprehensive assessment of the quality and reliability of community water services in Robeson County, interventions to address problems identified, and much more engagement with the community about identifying and allocating funding to solve water security problems.https://doi.org/10.1088/1748-9326/ada4c2water securityequitable infrastructurecommunity-based participatory researchsemi-structured interviews |
| spellingShingle | Hana C Long Beverly Collins-Hall Kaelan Moore Bethany Cutts Jacqueline MacDonald Gibson Water security in North Carolina’s most economically insecure county: a case study Environmental Research Letters water security equitable infrastructure community-based participatory research semi-structured interviews |
| title | Water security in North Carolina’s most economically insecure county: a case study |
| title_full | Water security in North Carolina’s most economically insecure county: a case study |
| title_fullStr | Water security in North Carolina’s most economically insecure county: a case study |
| title_full_unstemmed | Water security in North Carolina’s most economically insecure county: a case study |
| title_short | Water security in North Carolina’s most economically insecure county: a case study |
| title_sort | water security in north carolina s most economically insecure county a case study |
| topic | water security equitable infrastructure community-based participatory research semi-structured interviews |
| url | https://doi.org/10.1088/1748-9326/ada4c2 |
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