A Washington County legislator said expanding public waterlines into rural areas is one of the biggest issues in his district.

"The problem is that these areas are rural and spread out, and the income levels of the people are not high enough to afford the costs," said Jesse White, D-Cecil. "There might be a good well and three houses down there's a bad well."

Mr. White said he advocates using slots money headed to the county to help with waterline expansion throughout the county. Reacting to a description of "pockets" of the county without water, Mr. White preferred to describe it as "gaping holes."

As it turns out, much of the western part of the county still does not have public water, despite a growing need due to well contamination and reductions in water volume.

For now, getting waterlines built is a municipality-by-municipality proposition. But several steps in that process prompted celebration yesterday with toasts involving glasses of sparkling water.

Pennsylvania American Water Co. announced completion of a $2.4 million project that has provided public water to two new areas.

In a remote area of Collier, Allegheny County, 40 customers now have service on Steen Hollow, Boyds Run, Scotts Run and Lewis roads; and Gregg Station, Franklin, Dorrington, Cluxton and Spring streets connecting to Noblestown Road.

The expansion involves 19,200 feet of new waterline.

An 11,000-foot expansion of waterline on McCracken Hill and North Kings Creek roads in Hanover, Washington County, now provides service to 30 new customers.

Pennsylvania American also is scheduled to complete installation of waterlines in Mount Pleasant in Washington County in September 2009, and it also took over water service July 31 from the Claysville-Donegal Municipal Authority, in the company's slow progression westward across the county.

Pennsylvania American is the largest investor-owned water utility in the state and now provides service to more than 2.1 million people. It also provides operation and maintenance services to an additional 112,000 people statewide.

"We're working with communities, the county commissioners and state reps," said William Kelvington, Pennsylvania Water vice president of operations, noting that waterline expansion costs about $90 a foot in rural areas. "This takes a team effort to accomplish this.

"We're looking for solutions, not barriers."

Washington County Commissioner Bracken Burns said the problem is the lack of a comprehensive strategy, which slows down and sometimes halts progress. For example, it took about a decade of effort to get water service to 30 customers in Hanover.

There are 850 entities in southwestern Pennsylvania, he said, that have a decision-making hand in operating, overseeing or authorizing water and sewage service. It's put the region in "a quagmire."

"It's an enormous problem, the way the government is structured," Mr. Burns said. "There's not even a single group to discuss it."

Throughout the 250-year history of southwestern Pennsylvania, there's never been an easy way to discuss or plan water and sewage management, he said.

The result is a region that always has had a problem with planning and economies of scale in water and sewage service.

"If we never get together and talk about it, there's chaos," Mr. Burns said.

Mr. White said he heard complaints from constituents about contaminated and dry wells within 48 hours of his election in 2006. But he said people must agree they need public water, take formal action to get the process rolling and be willing to pay tap-in fees and the monthly water bill.

Then it becomes a matter of obtaining state grants and loans, working with the municipality or authority and other levels of government to keep the project flowing.

"One thing I've learned about infrastructure, you move one step at a time," Mr. White said. "This is a marathon, not a sprint."