Water Service and Inequity in Mobile Home Parks with UCLA’s Greg Pierce

Today’s podcast episode features Greg Pierce, Professor of Urban Planning at UCLA, Research and Co-Executive Director at UCLA’s Luskin Center for Innovation, Director of UCLA’s Water Resource Lab, and Director of UCLA’s Human Right Water Lab.

During this conversation, Greg addresses water equity issues affecting mobile home parks, emphasizing the importance for anyone concerned about small systems to also prioritize the issues faced by these communities, i.e., mobile home park water systems. Plus, Reese Tisdale makes an appearance to discuss Eversource’s decision to divest Aquarion on this month’s Bluefield on Tap segment.

In this session, you’ll learn about:

• Greg’s unique journey to the water industry and WASH research focused on the United States
• How Greg defines mobile home parks and how mobile home parks compare and contrast with manufactured housing
• Why mobile home parks are an important barometer for measuring WASH issues
• How mobile home parks typically receive and manage water services
• The challenges mobile home park water systems face in complying with Safe Drinking Water Act regulations
• The technical, managerial, and financial challenges faced by mobile home park water systems
• Why it’s difficult to gather data on how much mobile home park residents pay for water services
• Why neighboring water systems often decline to provide water services to mobile home parks
• How water equity issues in mobile home parks are emblematic of broader inequity issues facing mobile home parks including general infrastructure, heat, fire, ramifications of climate change, stigma, and more
• What “premise plumbing” means for mobile home parks and why it’s a problem
• Potential solutions and policy initiatives to improve water equity in mobile home parks

Resources and links mentioned in or relevant to this session include:

• Greg’s LinkedIn page
• Greg’s email address
• Greg’s X handle
• UCLA Luskin Center for Innovation’s website
• NIST website

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