Department Menu

Water Education and Outreach

Click here for an informational brochure on “Do It Yourself Household Water Assessment.”

For further assistance or tips on water conservation, contact:

Rockdale Water Resources: 770-278-7400
After-Hour Emergencies: 770-278-7500

Homeowner’s Septic System Guide and Maintenance Record File
Click here for an informational brochure on how to properly maintain a septic system.

For further assistance on septic tank maintenance, inspections or general inquiries, contact:

Environmental Health: 770-278-7340
Rockdale Water Resource: 770-278-7400

Clean Water Act and Helpful Links

Clean Water Act Section 101: Intended to restore and maintain the chemical, physical, and biological integrity of the nation’s waters.

Inventory of Potential Individual Sources of Pollution: Map & Chart

Section 404: (www.epa.gov) Establishes a program to regulate the discharge of dredged and fill material into waters of the United States, including wetlands. Activities in waters of the United States that are regulated under this program include fills for development, water resource projects (such as dams and levees), infrastructure development (such as highways and airports), and conversion of wetlands to uplands for farming and forestry.

Helpful Links:
Center for Watershed Protection: www.cwp.org
Environmental Protection Division: www.dnr.state.ga.us
Atlanta Regional Commission: www.atlantaregional.com
Metropolitan North Georgia Water Planning District: www.northgeorgiawater.com
Clean Water Campaign: www.cleanwatercampaign.com
Stormwater Manager’s Resource Center: www.stormwatercenter.net
DNR Water Conservation: DNR Water Conservation

Backflow Prevention

Backflow Prevention provides protection from contaminates and pollutants that might enter the County’s drinking water. This can come through cross connections and changes in the hydraulic conditions within the system. Rockdale Water Resources takes precautions to protect the systems water quality against contamination from backflow. This is done through the use of devices made specifically to prevent these problems and by implementation of good operations practices.

The Backflow Prevention division oversees the installation and testing of Backflow Prevention devices for commercial, industrial and institutional customers. All devices must be installed to Rockdale Water Resources’ specifications and tested annually.

For additional information contact Joe Camp, Backflow Prevention Coordinator, at 770-278-7414.

Backflow Prevention — RWR Backflow and Prevention Test and Maintenance Report

Backflow Prevention — Approved Backflow Prevention Device Testers List

Backflow Prevention — Testers submittal

Outdoor Watering Tips

Watering your lawn

Provide lawns with one inch of water weekly. Whether you have an irrigation system or are watering with a sprinkler, you can easily measure how much water is being applied to your lawn, with these simple directions. Set some empty tuna cans on your lawn where the water will reach them.

Turn on the irrigation system or sprinkler and let it run for 15 minutes
Collect the tuna cans and pour all of the water into one can
Measure the depth of the combined water in the can and divide by the number of cans you used.
This will give you an average since your sprinkler system could be putting out different volumes at different locations in the lawn.
Multiply the average amount by 4 to see how much water your system is putting out in an hour.

(You do this last step because you only collected water for one 15 minute segments an hour).

Knowing your lawn needs one inch of water a week, you can now adjust your watering time to fulfill its needs. You may have to split your watering into two applications because it is difficult to apply an inch of water all at one time without losing some to runoff.

Watering your container garden

Water container gardens daily or water the top 2-4 inches of potting soil that appears dry

Watering your vegetable gardening

How much water your garden needs will vary depending on soil type, stage of growth of the plants, amount of rainfall and the temperature, but most vegetable gardens require about 1 to 1 ½ inches of moisture per week during the growing season. Water often enough to keep the moisture level fairly uniform. In medium and heavy soils, an application of about 1 inch of water per week is needed. Follow the directions under the lawn to tell how much your sprinkler or drip system is putting out. For drip irrigation system, simply put the can under the hose so it drips into it.

Flowers

Adequate moisture is essential to the growth of flowers. Natural rainfall is sufficient at times of the year, but cannot be relied upon as the sole source. Supplemental irrigation is often necessary, particularly during the summer months. Most flowering plants vary in their drought tolerance per week. More may be required during periods of extreme heat. Overhead sprinklers provide the least satisfactory method of watering; they must run for long periods in order to attain deep watering of the soil. Occasional sprinkling that only wets the upper inch of soil is undesirable. Wet foliate may also worsen foliar disease problems and compound problems with control. Drip or trickle irrigation is preferable.

Note: Of course, use a rain gauge so you can adjust how much water it is raining.

Watershed Management

What is a Watershed?
A watershed is all the contributory area of land that drains to a lake, river, stream or wetland. A watershed can be as big as the southeastern U.S. or as small as your backyard.

In general, a watershed is considered to be the land area and tributaries that drain into a major stream. Rockdale County is divided into five major watersheds for this study:

South River
Honey Creek
Snapping Shoals
Yellow River
Big Haynes CreekSince water does not obey political boundaries, the EPA encourages communities to study their water resources on a watershed basis through a watershed assessment and management plan.

Why a Watershed Assessment?
Rockdale County is growing rapidly. The rapid growth is creating several challenges for the county, including the need to provide adequate supplies of drinking water and wastewater treatment capacity, while maintaining the water quality of our streams and minimizing flooding problems. To balance these objectives and guide growth in an environmentally-sensitive manner, Rockdale County is conducting a watershed assessment and developing a watershed management plan.

What is a Watershed Assessment?

A watershed assessment determines the quality of streams and rivers while identifying potential sources of water quality problems.

A watershed assessment usually consists of the following five major steps:

Conduct a water quality assessment in the major watersheds to define the problems
Set goals and identify solutions
Design a long-term monitoring program
Develop a draft management plan
Implement the adopted management plan.