Joining the Indiana American Water system: How a municipality becomes part of the American Water network

As a community grows and develops, effective management of its water and wastewater systems becomes more important than ever. When municipal leaders find that the pressures on their existing utilities have outgrown what they can reasonably handle, they can find themselves needing to invest large sums of money into developing new infrastructure and maintaining current lines. In these situations, it often makes more sense to sell the water system to the experts at Indiana American Water. 

“There are a lot of different factors that can drive a municipality to sell its water system,” Indiana American Water Director of Business Development Justin Schneider said. “One of the most prominent is capital investment needs. When infrastructure reaches the end of its useful life, and it is expensive to build new, it can often be cost prohibitive for a municipality to make necessary capital outlays while managing rates so that customers can still pay their bills.”

Indiana American Water can offer a lifeline to communities facing rising water management and maintenance costs. In addition to handling upgrades to the water system, Indiana American Water also helps ensure that its systems comply with current and future regulations without breaking customers’ wallets.

The goal is to make the transition from municipal management to being an Indiana American Water customer seamless, with residents often finding the experience improves thanks to the advanced customer tools available through their MyWater account. Behind the scenes, Indiana American Water teams complete extensive work to integrate the acquired system into the company’s broader network, ensuring customers benefit from enhanced service and modernized support.

“Once the acquisition is approved by the Indiana Utility Regulatory Commission and there’s a closing date, we start making the transition and investment with technology to be better operate that system,” Schneider said. “Over time, we’ll do comprehensive planning studies and develop capital plans. The process begins before we take a system over when we are doing our due diligence, collaborating with the community and its employees to better understand the system and their needs.”

Indiana American Water works closely with municipal leaders and their utility employees who already are familiar with the purchased system to address priority issues immediately after the transition. Indiana American Water discusses employment options with employees from the municipality as part of the transition process, combining their familiarity with the system with Indiana American Water’s technology and resources.

“It really depends on the needs of the community,” Schneider said. “More often than not, municipal employees will join Indiana American Water and become part of our team. When we bring those employees on, we’re bringing on all their historical knowledge. One of the biggest challenges utilities face is that, when someone leaves, they take their knowledge with them, and you can find yourself starting from scratch with new people. We like when the municipal employees can join our team and teach our people.”

As Indiana American Water continues to add systems, it builds a stronger, more resilient network that can share resources as needed. Its acquisition of the water systems in Lake Station, Lowell  and Silver Creek in recent years have helped to expand the network and the talent working on it.

When possible, Indiana American Water strives to build regionalized water systems to improve resiliency in its systems. 

“It’s definitely a benefit when we acquire systems in close proximity to each other. Taking small, isolated systems and putting them together builds resiliency and redundancy in the system,” Schneider said. “A community might have two storage tanks but put two or three together and you now have five tanks that can serve a bigger area during emergencies like a fire or a main break.”

For customers, joining the Indiana American Water system comes with plenty of benefits. Indiana American Water customers get access to the utility’s digital portal, letting customers pay their bill, receive financial assistance, and learn more about their water system with online resources. Indiana American Water additionally invests heavily in its communities, improving service lines,supporting local businesses and organizations, andmaintaining the natural environment. There are many invisible benefits that a municipality feels once it joins Indiana American Water, including giving elected officials the opportunity to focus on their roles in running local government instead of managing their water and wastewater utility. 

To learn more about Indiana American Water and how it can support your community, you can visit amwater.com/inaw.