Most of us take safe, reliable drinking water flowing from our household faucets for granted - until it's not there.

But other homes and communities in remote western South Dakota are still waiting to get good quality drinking water delivered to them for the first time ever via the Mni Wiconi Rural Water System, a decade after the regional pipeline system was first authorized by Congress.

Sen. Tim Johnson and Sen. John Thune this week introduced the Mni Wiconi Rural Water System Supply Extension Act to ensure the project is completed in the next five years.

As Congress works to finish the 2008 budget, Johnson and Thune chose to introduce the re-authorization of Mni Wiconi as a stand alone bill because of its vital importance to western South Dakota. And as a member of the Senate Appropriations Committee, Johnson also included the authorization extension in the 2008 Energy and Water Appropriations Bill.

We're pleased to see our senate delegation is working together and pursuing every possible route to make sure this essential project stays on track.

We agree with Thune that the need for Mni Wiconito be fully operational cannot be overstated. After all, it means "water is life.'

In the middle of the wealthiest nation on earth, South Dakotans shouldn't be forced to drink bad-tasting, inadequate groundwater from unsafe wells or to haul potable water long distances. These are infrastructure limitations that 99 percent of the residents in the U.S. haven't had to deal with in the last 75 years, Johnson said. Neither should the residents of the Oglala Sioux Nation, many of whom are still waiting for Missouri River water to arrive at their kitchen sinks.

First funded in 1998, the Mni Wiconi system that brings clean river water westward to thousands of homes is now 70 percent complete. The federal and state government have already invested $326 million on the pipeline, which will serve approximately 51,000 people in an area roughly the size of Connecticut when it is finished.

But authorization for its funding expires at the end of 2008. About $120 million remains in federal appropriations for the project, or about $20 million annually for construction through 2013, the new target completion date.

This re-authorization bill gives Mni Wiconi some needed breathing room. We urge the Democrat-controlled Congress to extend the project and to move quickly to pass the necessary appropriation bill to complete it.