In March, this column asked Municipal Sewer & Water readers to share their equivalent of what I called a “fire chief speech” — a short argument to use in a public meeting when someone questions the importance of spending money on the local wastewater infrastructure.

The term “fire chief speech” came from just such a presentation I heard from a town fire chief when residents at a town meeting questioned a large investment in new fire-fighting equipment.

“Now, how would the discussion go if you had to get up in public and defend your department and your budget?” I wrote back then. “Could you talk about it in words as compelling as those the fire chief used?”

Andrew Sullivan, utilities operator with the Utilities Division at the City of Eden Prairie, Minn., was quick to respond. What he sent me is not exactly a speech, although it could be used that way. It’s actually an article that appears on the city’s Web site.

Sullivan and his team, as part of their jobs, make sure that the wastes produced by more than 60,000 homes and business customers makes it to the Blue Lake wastewater treatment plant in Shakopee. As part of that, they clean, inspect and service some 200 hundred miles of sewer lines, 22 lift stations and more than 3,000 manholes.

I think Sullivan is on to something. What he sets down in his article, titled “Zen and the Art of Sewer System Maintenance: Saving the world one manhole at a time,” is a line of argument people in the profession know and understand, but may not articulate well, if they use it at all.

So, for the good of the order, I offer excerpts from Sullivan’s article, also found on a blog on the city Web site (http://edenprairieweblogs. org/scottneal/post/1600).

So I am sitting there watching that really smug guy from “Dirty Jobs,” Mike Rowe, do a show from the bottom of a sewer lift station. He is scraping big hunks of (insert colorful metaphor) off the lift station walls while a giant vacuum truck called a Vactor sucks it all up.

Wow, these Vactor trucks are all business, let me tell you. I mean, they can suck a bowling ball (or your arm) up from depths of 30 feet! ... Anyway, there’s Rowe, in his waders and raincoat, sewage pouring in all around him, and he does this kind of slight dry heave, looks to the camera and says, “This is it, this is the worst, the worst thing I have ever done, right here.”

In case you missed that, Rowe was talking about cleaning lift stations as the worst job he has ever done. We have 22 sewer lift stations in our town. … You know, that whole business of celebrating the workers doing the dirty work so the rest of us can lead clean and civilized lives is really a great concept. And I have to admit it is pretty cool, seeing Rowe ... doing the things we do every day in Eden Prairie, on national television, no less!

But there is much more to this sewer business than just stepping in it, wading in it, and saying the word “poo” like your ratings depended on it. For instance:

• Did you know that scientists chose sanitation (sewage disposal and clean water) as the greatest medical breakthrough since 1840? A close second was antibiotics, then came anesthesia, vaccines, and finally the discovery of DNA structure. Really? Sewage dis-posal, over DNA? Yep. I guess it does make some sense when you think it through. I mean, really, what good is DNA if you are dead?

• In one year alone the lack of sewage disposal, clean water and thus hygiene, accounted for over 1.5 million deaths worldwide from diarrheal-type diseases. ... Think it can’t happen here in the U.S.? Think Katrina.

• And finally, for you anthropological folks, let’s finish with a quiz: According to experts, what key factor contributed more to the advancement or success of civilizations, both old and new? ... If you answered, “a working sewer system,” you are correct. So, while you are out there flying Mars missions, cracking the human genome, or building microscopic nanobots, just remember this: None of it would be possible if your toilet didn’t flush!

You might consider trying some of Sullivan’s arguments, in your own words, next time you’re out in public defending your department’s projects or budget. He framed the essence of the value of sewer infrastructure about as well as anyone could.