The old maxim about “garbage in, garbage out” holds true for many things, including the continuous process-improvement program run by the city of Bellevue (Wash.) Utilities Department. The program, which tracks hundreds of performance measures to benchmark against other utilities, is only as good as the data collected.
As such, water and sewer crews in Bellevue are much more than just repair people or inspectors. They are walking, talking data-collection centers who document their activities daily as part of a broader effort to deploy resources as effectively as possible, says Joe Harbour, operations manager.
“Like many utilities, we face constrained budgets and
