LCA Recognized for Financial Reporting, Water Treatment Optimization
March 7, 2025LCA employees’ hard work is paying off! Two awards have been presented to LCA for excellence in water treatment and financial management — the Area Wide Optimization Program (AWOP) Award and the Excellence in Financial Reporting Award.
“Congratulations to our employees on these prestigious awards,” said CEO Liesel Gross. “Your dedication and service is so important to the community, and these awards illustrate your unwavering commitment to our mission.”
Advances in Water Treatment
This is the 18th year in a row our Allentown Water Filtration Plant team has been recognized with the AWOP Award. The award is presented to participants that meet the American Water Works Association Partnership for Safe Water program’s water quality standards. Continually meeting these standards, which are more stringent than state and federal requirements, is just one demonstration of our commitment to providing customers with high-quality, safe, and reliable water service.
The LCA team has been steadily identifying and implementing advancements to the treatment plant and process that have helped us meet the AWOP requirements—including adjusting our operating procedures, investing more work hours, and purchasing and repairing equipment.
For instance, treating water during storms historically has been challenging. However, it has helped our team to become more proficient at reacting to changing water conditions, with new standard operating procedures in place to manage water quality during rain events. In addition, the team has developed new maintenance protocols to remove solids that have settled out of the water during the treatment process. By removing this material more often, the plant can produce a higher volume of excellent quality water on a more consistent basis.
Commitment to Excellence
“It is with great pride and appreciation that I announce our achievement of earning the Area Wide Optimization Program Award for the 18th consecutive year,” Water Treatment Plant Manager Steve Lettko wrote in an email congratulating his team. “This incredible milestone is a testament to your dedication, expertise, and commitment to excellence every single day.”
“Earning this recognition year after year is no small feat—it reflects the hard work, teamwork, and passion that each of you brings to our mission of providing safe drinking water. Your efforts not only uphold our high standards but also make a meaningful impact on our community,” he wrote.
Transparent Accounting
The second is an award for Excellence in Financial Reporting, presented to Lehigh County Authority and our Chief Financial Officer Edward Klein by the Government Finance Officers Association (GFOA) of the United States and Canada for their work on the 2023 financial report. Our team has won this award, which recognizes Klein and the accounting team for their detail-oriented approach to our finances, every year since 1984!
“We are honored to receive this prestigious award for financial reporting. Our dedicated employees make this achievement possible,” Klein said.
In a press release announcing the honor, GFOA says the 2023 report met the program’s high standards, including demonstrating a constructive “spirit of transparency and full disclosure” to communicate its financial story.
The release says the GFOA launched the Certificate of Achievement for Excellence in Financial Reporting Program in 1945 “to encourage and assist state and local governments to go beyond the minimum requirements of generally accepted accounting principles to prepare annual comprehensive financial reports that evidence the spirit of transparency and full disclosure and then to recognize individual governments that succeed in achieving that goal. The Certificate of Achievement is the highest form of recognition in governmental accounting and financial reporting. Congratulations, again, for having satisfied the high standards of the program.”
You can read more about LCA’s finances and capital plans here.