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WVU's WaterLink maps water‑quality risks; presenter pushes community mapping
Summary
A WVU Center for Resilient Communities researcher demonstrated WaterLink, a dashboard that maps Safe Drinking Water Act violations, impaired streams and social vulnerability in West Virginia, and said the project will host community mapping to fill data gaps and prioritize responses.
MORGANTOWN, W.Va. — Samuel Bain of West Virginia University's Center for Resilient Communities presented WaterLink, a GIS and dashboard tool designed to visualize water‑quality risk and environmental‑justice indicators across West Virginia.
Bain said WaterLink aggregates data from the EPA, the state Department of Health and Human Resources, the Public Service Commission and the Department of Environmental Protection to create six thematic maps (waterways, abandoned mine lands, industrial dischargers, treatment facilities and costs, Safe Drinking Water Act violations, and social vulnerability). He said the Safe Drinking Water Act map covers 2020 through mid‑2025 and identified hot spots in the southern coalfield and the Eastern Panhandle; he noted Wyoming County had 108 violations between 2020 and mid‑2025.
Bain emphasized the project's limits and next steps: data gaps exist, some impairment categories are not mapped to specific contaminants, and community mapping sessions will invite local stakeholders to provide lived experience that can augment and correct datasets. "We understand that there are gaps in the data, and we're not taking it as 100% truth," he said, noting community input would help prioritize remediation and monitoring.
Council members asked whether community meetings would be held locally; Bain said planning would begin in January with an initial meeting in the Deckers Creek watershed and then expand to other high‑risk regions as partners permit.
No council action was taken. Bain provided a QR code linking to the project's website and a Google form for residents interested in contributing local knowledge.
