Some of the water mains running under Fort Washington, Cheltenham, and Temple Hills are aging, and Prince George's County is finally getting money to replace them. The Maryland Board of Public Works approved $11.8 million in loans and loan forgiveness for three WSSC Water projects in the county, part of a nearly $23 million statewide clean water funding package announced by the Maryland Department of the Environment.
The single largest piece of the local funding, $4.8 million, is earmarked for Larkwood Avenue in Fort Washington, where crews will replace a water main that has been in the ground for 65 years, according to Prince George's County Government. The new pipes are built with a life expectancy of at least 100 years. Two other county projects rounded out the package: up to $3.6 million for the Rolling Acres project in Cheltenham, and another $3.6 million for Weldon Drive in Temple Hills for a water and sewer main replacement project.
A Statewide Push Beyond Prince George's County
The Prince George's County allocations are only part of the picture. Alongside the loans, the Board of Public Works approved nearly $2.5 million in Bay Restoration Fund grants to support operations and maintenance at five WSSC Water Resource Recovery Facilities spanning Prince George's and Montgomery counties, according to WSSC Water. Statewide, the package includes funding for ongoing operations and maintenance at wastewater treatment plants across Maryland, covering the work of keeping those facilities running.
That maintenance work matters because it's part of the effort to keep nutrient pollution out of the Chesapeake Bay. Wastewater plant operators oversee the treatment and upkeep needed to keep those facilities operating, per the county's announcement.
This isn't the first big infrastructure check the state has cut for the region this summer. Just two weeks before the September approval, the Maryland Department of the Environment had already announced $40 million for six other major water main replacement projects serving WSSC Water customers in Prince George's and Montgomery counties. WSSC Water serves roughly 1.9 million customers and operates more than 11,000 water and sewer mains serving Prince George's and Montgomery counties, a network that officials acknowledge is aging in many places at once.
Timed to Bay Restoration Milestones
The funding announcement lands weeks after Governor Wes Moore announced that Maryland had hit nearly all of its 2025 Chesapeake Bay Watershed Agreement targets, meeting 100% of its sediment reduction goal, 100% of its phosphorus goal, and 99% of its nitrogen reduction goal for the 2009-2025 evaluation period, according to the Office of Governor Wes Moore. Maryland Department of the Environment Secretary Serena McIlwain said the state met nearly all of its pollution reduction goals and improved the health of the Chesapeake Bay, according to the county's announcement. State officials have framed the new operations and maintenance money as necessary to avoid backsliding on those gains now that many plants have been upgraded.
The stakes for the bay extend into the local economy as well. Cleaner waterways generate about $3.2 billion a year in Maryland tourism-related economic activity, and the state's seafood industry contributes nearly $600 million annually, per figures cited in the county's release. Officials also point to clean water projects as drivers of local jobs.
Part of a Broader Funding Pattern
The Prince George's County allocations fit into a wider pattern of state and federal spending on Maryland's water systems this year. In February, U.S. Senators Chris Van Hollen and Angela Alsobrooks secured $29.6 million in federal funding for 28 community water and environmental restoration projects statewide, as reported by WBOC. Maryland also has other water-funding efforts, and the Board of Public Works has approved funding for water projects.
Regionally, WSSC Water and the Maryland Department of the Environment are also looking beyond routine pipe repairs toward long-term water security. In June, the two launched Secure the Source, a $25 million feasibility study examining secondary emergency water supply options for the roughly 5 million residents of the Washington metropolitan area who depend on the Potomac River, according to the Interstate Commission on the Potomac River Basin. The broader discussion also includes stormwater runoff, another issue in regional water planning.
Taken together, the funding underscores a persistent tension in Maryland's environmental strategy: balancing the cost of maintaining aging point-source infrastructure like WSSC Water's pipe network against continued investment in nonpoint agricultural and stormwater runoff solutions as the state looks toward its 2040 environmental goals. For residents on Larkwood Avenue, in Rolling Acres, and on Weldon Drive, the more immediate outcome will be work associated with the approved water infrastructure projects.
