Santa Cruz - Laguna Water District

Santa Cruz, the capital town of Laguna, was served by water system originally constructed on 1920 with one well as main source and an elevated concrete reservoir called the Elbo Water System. In later years, two wells were added at Barangay Pagsawitan, a river infiltration gallery and at Barangay San Pablo Norte, a deep well. Only the town proper and a few adjacent barangays were served by these systems. The water quality and system pressure was very poor and inefficient. These systems was operated by different waterwork administrations for many years and was finally given a new management with the creation of Santa Cruz Water District on June 25, 1980 in accordance with the Presidential Decree No. 198.

With the creation of Santa Cruz Water District, an improvement was made. The system pressure was improved through 100% metering of all registered connections, replacement of all pumping equipment in three existing production wells with effective and efficient units and service to the concessionaires for longer hours. Water quality was also improved through installation of chlorination equipment. Other improvements were made gradually through the years with the different managements that handled the operations of the District but the most dramatic and widely felt improvements were made and undertaken by the present management.

The present management lives up to the Mission and Vision of the District to operate on a full twenty- four- hour basis, with no interruption since all the pumping stations were equipped with back up generating systems as stand-by in cases of power interruption and pre-arranged blackouts. The old production wells serving the municipality were abandoned and replaced with new ones. Also three new production wells were constructed and added to the system. They were established in different strategic locations to give way for the construction and installation of more distribution lines that paved the way for reaching far flung barangays of Santa Cruz, Laguna. The whole municipality is now being served by Santa Cruz Water District where the barrio folks can now avail adequate but cheap, potable and safe water twenty- four hours.

The total registered service connections as of April 2015 is 11,349 including institutional, government and commercial establishments. The present concern of the management is to further improve the system pressure by constructing more production wells in anticipation of the rapid growth of population and economy of Santa Cruz, Laguna. Another major concern is the replacement of old pipelines in the whole distribution system. This is to fully comply with the mandate of Presidential Decree No. 198 to serve the people with adequate, safe, cheap and potable water.