By MARGARET PAGELER, President, Seattle City Council

Is Seattle's water supply vulnerable to terrorist attacks? How can we be sure our water system is protected?

First, Seattle Public Utilities (SPU) constantly monitors and guards the purity of your drinking water. Our water supply comes from two pristine watersheds. The water is treated to eliminate contaminants. Chlorine is a very effective disinfectant for germs. SPU adds chlorine to our water and monitors the water purity and chlorine levels to ensure that the water in your tap is fresh and safe.

A new treatment plant has just opened to provide an even higher level of purity for Tolt River water and a treatment facility combining ultraviolet and ozone technologies will be completed for Cedar River water by 2004.

Second, multiple security measures are in place to provide security for the water system. No, of course we're not going to say exactly how the surveillance systems work or where we've deployed guards and monitors and alarms. But rest assured, we are on alert. SPU is working with water suppliers all over America to update our security systems and make sure we're doing the very best we can to protect this essential service.

Third, we must cover all our Seattle reservoirs so they can't be contaminated from outside. Seattle is one of only a few large American cities that still have open reservoirs. In 1996, the Seattle City Council approved a plan to put covers on all the reservoirs in the city. Five years later, not a single reservoir has been covered, and the cost has escalated by more than $5 million.

What's gone wrong?

SPU dollars have been repeatedly diverted to other priorities. Endangered salmon, water conservation, subsidies for Sound Transit, daylighting creeks, automated public toilets - there's always a more immediately appealing priority for our utility funds. Each of these is a worthy cause, but often a small group of single-issue advocates virtually hijacks the utility to serve their own agenda. The result: the reservoir cover project gets put on the back burner again and again.

In addition, the neighbors around each reservoir see the projects as an opportunity to request either improvements such as walking trails, park landscaping or playgrounds. The community process takes time and can become contentious as residents organize to demand more "mitigation." At one reservoir, there's a lawsuit that's already resulted in a two-year delay and cost overruns of $5 million.

Please join me in supporting clear mandates for reservoir protection. Please let your other Seattle elected officials know you see covering reservoirs as a top priority.

Until all the reservoirs are covered, there must be no new diversions of utility funds for non-utility purposes, whether humanitarian or environmental or neighborhood improvement. Covering our reservoirs must be recognized as an essential public health and safety measure that does not need to be "mitigated" by providing amenities for immediate neighbors.

Seattle Public Utilities has a strong commitment to water system security and will continue to make safety improvements. SPU monitors and protects your safe drinking water with all the technological and personal commitment you have a right to expect. Now let's complete the job by getting our reservoirs covered.

Margaret Pageler can be contacted by calling 684-8807 or by sending e-mail to margaret.pageler@ci.seattle.wa.us. (