Colorado Operator Gets High Water Marks

Colorado Operator Gets High Water Marks

Colorado Operator Gets High Water Marks

According to an article in the Boulder, CO Daily Camera, Steve Miller wants to change the image of business people in Boulder, that profit rules and everything else is secondary.

For Miller, the bottom line is this: He lives here, too.

For nearly 30 years, Miller's family has operated a car wash in Boulder, first on 28th Street on land now part of Crossroads Mall, and for the last 20 years at 3100 28th St., where it's known as Puddle Car Wash.

Last spring, a year after Colorado's worst drought in a century, the company installed a water reclamation system that reduced fresh water use to 19.5 gallons per car, compared to the industry average of 35 gallons. And since then, Puddle has managed to bring it down to 16 gallons.

Miller, who on Feb. 6 will be honored by the Boulder Chamber of Commerce as Business Person of the Year, says it was simply the right thing to do.

"I've been in the water business for 20 years and I've always lived in the West," says Miller, 49. "I flush my toilet every other time at home and I've been doing that since I was a kid."

Miller, who was raised in California, moved to Boulder in 1982 to work with his parents, Bob and Carolyn Miller, who bought the family's first Boulder car wash in 1975. And he's made Boulder his home ever since.

"Maybe I've been taking a more active role as I get older," says Miller, who has worked with the chamber in addressing the debate over the city's ratio of jobs to its population. "Sometimes the business person is projected as the big bad guy who just wants money and is sucking everything up. But people need to remember that we live here, too, and we love the place.

"Anybody you talk to here has a real desire to be here. They could have picked another place to do business."

In selecting its business person of the year, the chamber looks for people who have consistently contributed their business expertise to the city, Vice President Alice Swanson says.

"We feel through his involvement with the chamber and his involvement in some of the advocacy issues, that he was a great candidate," she says.

Miller says he's not someone who seeks the limelight and quips that the chamber "must have lowered the bar" when it selected him.

"I'm fortunate, through the chamber especially, to be able to be around people I admire and respect," he says.

Miller can't hide his passion for his business. He regularly checks in with a friend who owns several car washes in Denver to compare notes on the industry. And he loves to talk about water — and how we're going to preserve it."

"The way we dispose of water is going to become more important than the way we consume water," he says. "When water goes back into a stream bed or a storm drain or a ditch, it's not treated and it can pollute Boulder Creek. We need to be more responsible."