We all need safe drinking water to survive, and often take its availability for granted. Once in a while, however, we’re reminded what happens when we can’t easily get it, like the families in Flint, Michigan with a polluted public water supply which may have jeopardized the health of thousands of children. Towns and cities all across the country are keenly aware of the need to protect valuable water sources, ever mindful that millions of folks around the world don’t have the luxury of safe drinking water.

Except for the younger generation, most of us grew up assuming that while everything seemed to have a price tag attached to it, water was still free. Not anymore. The cost of public water service continues to rise, with many homeowners now choosing to dig their own wells. Sadly, many restaurants no longer offer you a glass of water with your meal. If you want water, you’re welcome to purchase it, which brings me to my pet peeve of the week: The outrageous cost of bottled water.

We were more than a bit miffed not too long ago when we went to a dispensing machine to purchase a drink with our morning muffin only to discover the water was the same price as the soft drinks and juices: $1.89 (high soda prices is another story). We decided our current income bracket couldn’t really justify that much money for a glass of water.  Not that we haven’t paid that much, and more in the past, mind you. Bottled water prices are all over the spectrum. Of course, the “fancy’’ flavored kinds are much more pricey, but the same bottle, size and brand of plain old water can be .99 in one store and $2 another. What we really call fleecing is making a big profit when it doesn’t make sense, such as at a kids’ basketball game, especially when a water fountain isn’t readily accessible in or near the gym. Not fair. We know some bottled water sells wholesale for very little, we’ve all seen it, and when we are trying to encourage youngsters to drink more water, we shouldn’t try to rip them off by overcharging them.

While we’re all trying to come to grips with paying a lot of money for the relatively new concept of bottled water, some places are already trying to get rid of the small bottles. The city of San Francisco has outlawed bottled water, not so much because of the price, but in their case because of the environment and the millions and millions of chunks of plastic which go unrecycled.

Call us old-fashioned, but we’d like to see glasses of water still offered free at public places, and water fountains more prevalent so that folks could get a drink when they wanted it. As for dispensers, we hope those places which choose to try to make a killing on drinking water find that more and more of their repeat customers bring their own bottled water (which hopefully they’ve been able to acquire at a somewhat reasonable price) with them. Guess we’re just not ready to accept folks making a big profit on water!