SOCIAL: What's not to Like? Why Facebook's new reactions are fitting for utilities like ours in social media.

As a public utility on social media, we welcome the new reaction options Facebook offers. 

Could we see a lot more Angry reactions to rate stories? or Sad reactions to construction impacts in your community? Perhaps, but if those are honest reactions, then we want our social dialogues to be both honest and constructive.

We offer the following perspective on each of the new FB reactions and what they could mean for us and you who engage with us here.

#SewerBowl: Because we know the biggest games are won in the trenches.

Game on, football fans.

For the fourth straight year, water and sewer infrastructure will take the field during the Super Bowl as we cover some of the unexpected #SewerBowl stats and stories from our accounts.

From the beverages consumed to the systems that take it away from your homes safely, we and many other utilities know clean water doesn't take a day off to watch the game, halftime show, or commercials. Which is why we will find the unexpected connections between football and bring you the best on Twitter, Instagram and Facebook.

Our pups have made a prediction.

#SewerBowl Tweets

RELATED STORIES:

• WHY WE PLAY: SewerBowl shines light on the hidden systems that make it possible
• FACT? Did a city sewer actually burst under the force of a Super Bowl halftime flush?
• BOWLS: The Daily Beast takes a look at the (toilet) bowls that matter 

HISTORY: This viral list of 1915 facts is full of lies. Except the ones about water.

Turns out this viral list of 1915 "facts" rounding out 2015 is actually a fake, filled with untruths and misleading statements. But FWIW, it turns out the few about water are indeed true.

Gizmodo's Factually posted a breakdown of the list, a graphic that has made its internet rounds back in 2002 and 2006 with very few changes beyond a Photoshopped date. Based on the 1915 fact-checking, the water statements as shown below turn out to be true.

Only 14 percent of homes had a bathtub.
If this is referring to tubs with running water, that's probably true. The Cleveland Division of Water has been around in some form since the 1850s but even in 1915 its service was only beginning to reach beyond the city of Cleveland. In terms of sewers, a primary pipe taking sewage away from the city was not constructed until 1905 (and until a treatment plant was constructed in 1933, that sewage simply dumped out into Lake Erie).

A mechanical engineer could make about $5,000 per year.
Engineering is a huge part of water infrastructure generally, and that's true in our case. For comparisons today, a civil engineer starting annual salary averages $62,000.

Women only washed their hair once a month.
But we assume all of us are washing our hair more frequently in 2016, since on average Americans use 80-100 gallons of water per day.

Diarrhea was one of the six leading causes of death.
Sanitation improvements in the first half of the 1900s made tremendous strides in public health. Around the world, sanitation remains a huge concern: Diarrhea is still accountable for 20% of the six leading causes of child deaths worldwide.

Canned beer hadn't been invested yet.
True, it was not invented until 1935. And when we talk beer, we always say drink responsibly and flush responsibly.

ACTION: Start a movement. Join your voices and #RespectTheFlush

Give your drain the acclaim it deserves.

Every time you flush a toilet, drain your sink, or pass a manhole cover along the curb, amazing unseen things are happening that protect public health and the environment. What can you do to show you #RespectTheFlush?

To raise awareness of the value of our water resources, the Value of Water Coalition imagines a Day Without Water October 6-8 across the country. To complement that, one can not overlook the importance of the gray and green systems in place protecting them.

How do you Respect The Flush? Here are 5 simple ideas.

Tweet #RespectTheFlush

Don't flush wipes.
Disposable wipes are convenient, but they wreak havoc on sewer systems and damage equipment in treatment plants. Throw your baby wipes in the garbage instead of flushing them. And while you're at it, the same goes for the rest of the things on this list.

RIVALRY: Pittsburgh vs. Cleveland? Clean water is the business, but this could get dirty 9/19. #neorsdTOUR

We're taking the Cleveland/Pittsburgh rivalry off the field and into the water.

The Sewer District's Open House is Saturday, September 19, the same day Pittsburgh's Allegheny County Sanitary Authority ALCOSAN hosts their annual event. The two agencies will go head-to-head in a battle of attendance and social media.

RSVP: Join us at our September 19 Open House, and register early for a chance to win a prize pack!

Both @neorsd and @alcosanWWTP hope to draw well over a thousand guests each, but bragging rights will go to the winner with

• Highest overall attendance
• Greatest increase over 2014's event attendance
• Most event mentions on social media September 19

"Treating wastewater is our business," said Jeannie Chapman, @neorsd Manager of Community & Media Relations, "but there's sure to be a little trash talking come Saturday."

We encourage our social media followers on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook to mention our accounts or #neorsdTOUR to support your Cleveland wastewater treatment authority. And if you throw in any Pittsburgh jokes, be creative, at least try to keep them like our treated water: Clean.

LOOK: What happens one hour after drinking one glass of tap water

The possible health effects of a can of soda have been blogged and tweeted about for a long time, most recently in an infographic that made its rounds this week.

How your body responds to a glass of tap water? Perhaps even more shocking.

View full size.

#ALLinCLE: How an NBA Finals game and stormwater management are painfully similar

Not concerned. Have you heard about our Stormwater Management Program? @matthewdelly @kingjames #ALLinCLE @SFWater pic.twitter.com/xdkcm57dVq

— NE Oh Regional Sewer (@neorsd) June 12, 2015

What began as a tongue-in-cheek exchange between utilities in the heat of their cities' NBA Finals battle shed light on odd similarities between basketball and managing stormwater.

The Cavs' game 4 performance was painful, but it proved four important points that fans of the hardwood and sustainability can both embrace. Are there others you would add?

1. Good defense can beat good offense.

It proved itself in the Cavs' wins in games 2 and 3 as Cleveland's defense kept "Splash City's" shooters at bay. Stormwater management works the same way.

Stormwater runoff in Cleveland's heavy storms wreaks havoc on combined sewer systems for a variety of reasons. One solution is to but up a good defense on your property to slow the flow of the water much like slowing the flow of a powerful offense.

This can be done with downspout disconnects, reducing hard surfaces (known as impervious pavement), or increasing green spaces to allow water to soak into the ground rather than rushing off toward storm sewers, combined sewers, or local waterways. There are plenty of tips you can use at home.

SUMMER: Ready for beach season? So are we, Mass Spectrometer and all.

How new technology and capabilities will help us identify toxic algae in Lake Erie using a recently approved EPA method; Sewer District is the first agency to offer these capabilities in Ohio

Consider this the summer of science.

As our daily beach water-quality testing and notification is set to resume in the coming days, we've added a bit of tech to our monitoring capabilities to better evaluate toxic algae threats with warmer months ahead of us. And that's big news for the entire state of Ohio.

Something old, something new

This week, the Northeast Ohio Regional Sewer District resumes daily beach testing at Edgewater, Villa Angela and Euclid Beaches to predict and determine water quality for public notification. Daily testing will continue through September 10.

SUPER BOWL: From football to flush, #SewerBowl stats will have you covered again this year

We're covering the big game from the ground up.

For the second straight year, our #SewerBowl team will talk about the infrastructure and sewer news related to the Super Bowl to make connections to the services many Americans take for granted.

TECH: The movement behind the poop emoji, or Why talking #2 should be less taboo

I never realized the emoji had such a history.

Then again, many could say the same thing about the work it takes to get the out of wastewater: I never realized it had such a history.

Fast Company recently recounted how emojis—the tiny graphics that have become staples of the instant-messaging and social-media experience—came into existence, specifically the long but fascinating road Google traveled to bring the to the US and how it became the means of expression it is today.

The and emojis like it had origins in Japan in 1999, and the story examines how the cartoon expressions help tell stories and convey thoughts in ways that words can't. The push to include the in earliest emoji offerings was hard-fought, and judging on its prevalence today, the argument to do so was well-founded.

There's another relevant connection we see. The or or expressions all relate well to the work of wastewater treatment:

#CIFF38: Silence your phones during the movie, and don't tweet from the bathroom.

@CIFF @wallywaterdrop gr8 partnerships yield gr8 results (& dry phones) Ty @neorsd for sponsoring gr8est film fest pic.twitter.com/v7VvJwSDL5
— joecimperman (@joecimperman) April 11, 2013

The Cleveland International Film Festival returns today, and with 93,000+ admissions last year, we know all sorts of eyes will be focused on our city—and thousands of visitors will be making bathroom breaks between flicks.

That means "Lights, camera, action!" when it comes to some clean-water communication.

This is the third year we are sponsoring the CIFF, branding restrooms and stalls at Tower City Cinemas to help educate visitors in the form of a public service announcement.

#WaitToTweet made its debut at last year's CIFF and the message remains the same this year: We remind people that dropping a phone in the toilet is an all-too-common occurrence, and we suggest people think twice before tweeting from the stall. The message connects guests' everyday actions with the everyday work of wastewater treatment that rarely crosses minds.

SUPER BOWL: How does infrastructure play into the Big Game? #SewerBowl will live-tweet the flow facts

A recent survey shows 60% of Super Bowl viewers plan to use a mobile device while watching the big game.

While we haven't commissioned a [Dr. Evil style air quotes] "sur-vey" [end air quotes], our intuition tells us 100% of Super Bowl viewers also will either use the bathroom, run a faucet, or flush a toilet sometime during the game.

That gives us plenty to talk about.

This Sunday's Super Bowl between the Seattle Seahawks and the Denver Broncos will feature our first ever #SewerBowl: Live-tweeting from our @wallywaterdrop and @neorsd Twitter accounts as we share some unexpected sewer and infrastructure stats along with the live action.

EDUCATION: Bathroom signage to promote thinking twice about sustainability? They're not wastes of time, they're #StallTactics.

Statistics show we use the restroom about seven times every day. That means public restrooms get a lot of use, and based on the amount of wastewater we treat every day, we know that from experience.

In 2013, your Sewer District found some unique opportunities to educate and communicate in the very place where our business begins. Bathrooms.

THANKFUL: For connections made in 2013, plans laid for 2014 [#h2olidays]

Thank you. Most of you who follow our blog, Facebook posts, tweets and videos know how much we enjoy interacting with and serving you in this digital realm. And we very much appreciate the engagement we've shared throughout 2013.

When it comes to our work, this year has been eventful in many ways, and our commitment to customer service, the environment, and the betterment of our region will remain strong in the coming year.

Just as we have grown our social-media relationships in the recent past, 2014 will feature new ways to help customers better understand our work, their bills, and what it takes to keep our Great Lake great. If you have questions or ideas to help make that happen, share them with us.

We wish you a peaceful holiday season and a prosperous new year.

LIST: 10 ways Buzzfeed lists have inspired us to, well, make more lists

1. Lists give us a reason to post awesome photos.

2. And goofy gifs.

 

#RAINMATTERS: Special workshop will welcome local TV weather personalities

This afternoon, we've invited local TV meteorologists to join us for a #RainMatters workshop.

Chances of a stormwater education? 100 percent.

With the help of WKYC Chief Meteorologist Betsy Kling, the Sewer District designed a workshop to present the history of and relationship between sewers and the regional stormwater system. The workshop is worth continuing-education credits offered by the American Meteorological Society and National Weather Association.

SLIDESHARE: How and why @neorsd got social

Why is the Sewer District using social media? Because you are.

That's the simple answer we've offered before, but we recently presented these slides at a professionals networking event. It gives the past, present, and future of social media's role in our communication efforts, and even includes a few cautionary tales for social-media newcomers. You may want to view the full-screen version on Slideshare that includes the captions and content links.

Your Sewer District and social media? How @neorsd is using it, learning from it, educating with it from Northeast Ohio Regional Sewer District

RADIO, part II: "That's a significant drop." Yes, he is.

So when a caller to the WMMS 100.7 Alan Cox Show during Wednesday drivetime reacted to the hosts' conversation about Lake Erie's poor beachwater quality, he rightfully touched on the Sewer District's multi-billion-dollar program to fix some of the problems plaguing the lakefront.

We heard about the call yesterday morning, and our own Jean Chapman sent Alan Cox an email to clarify a few points the caller made. Why not, right? With that, we also used her email as a blog post, embedded a clip from the show's podcast, and added a few points for good measure. In good fun, our spokesdrop Wally tweeted @alancoxshow to let him know he gave us good material and an opportunity to share information.

Then came Thursday's show. Check it out.

QUESTION: What would you like to see?

Our monthly email blast—environotes—has been around for several years in several forms. First, it was a limited distribution print newsletter, then an email newsletter, and now a collection of the month's social-media highlights from your Sewer District.

At one time, we focused on public-officials news, then shifted to Sewer District accomplishments, and most recently widened the view to promote customer-service oriented news and opportunities. Our current maillist includes about 1,100 names of officials, citizens, educators, residents, and other interested followers.

We'd like your feedback: What kind of news best suits this email newsletter format? Are you subscribed? Would you subscribe? Why or why not?

As our own social media efforts have grown, most of our conversation, news, announcements and alerts that were once shared via environotes have more frequently been posted on our Facebook page, Twitter account, and and here on our blog. With that in mind, is this communication venue still helpful? Necessary? How can it better serve you as customers and Northeast Ohio residents?

Leave you comments below to help us determine a direction for this environotes project in 2012.

BEST OF: Wally's top tweets of 2011

When Wally Waterdrop posted his first tweet in 2009, we didn't know how we might use Twitter, or Facebook, or YouTube for our customers' benefit. Our top tweets reveal a few ways in which we hope our social media efforts made a difference. Check it out on Storify.