Is there a white paper, web source, or book that describes a water utility from the perspective of someone who is experienced in GIS but not a water utility. Everything I have found is more from the perspective of someone who knows a water utility but not GIS.
This might help - http://blogs.esri.com/esri/arcgis/2011/03/04/how-gis-supports-the-core-business-patterns-of-a-water-...
Also this is white paper about implementing ArcGIS for Water Utilities that should help - http://www.esri.com/library/whitepapers/pdfs/implementing-arcgis-for-water-utilities.pdf
Thanks for the reply Howard. Those are great, I had not come across them in my searching.
I am also interested in definitions of the various components, what they do, and how they fit into the model. For example, I didn't know that sampling stations don't need to be connected to the water distribution network, they can be free floating and are more for reporting. At least that's how I understand it.
The data dictionary from the Local Government Information Model might help -
Although important to point out that you aren't required to use the Local Government Information model if you are deploying any the ArcGIS for Water Utilities configurations.