[Water_news] 2. DWR'S CALIFORNIA WATER NEWS: SUPPLY - 8/7/08

Department of Water Resources

California Water News

A daily compilation of significant news articles and comment 

 

August 7 2008

 

2. Supply –

 

 

Mayor urges city to curb water use

Peninsula Beacon News- 8/6/08

 

Water supplies most urgent issue facing state

Ventura County Star- 8/7/08

 

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

 

Mayor urges city to curb water use

Peninsula Beacon News- 8/6/08

by Sebastian Ruiz

 

The clinking, sloshing glasses of ice water, dripping onto favorite restaurant tables, quenches thirsty beachfront restaurant patrons day and night.

 

But you may have to ask for that next refreshing glass of H2O if the restaurant heeds the city’s latest call for water saving efforts.

 

Recent findings released by city departments indicate San Diegans aren’t doing enough to curb water consumption, according to Mayor Jerry Sanders’ spokesman Bill Harris. This has prompted Mayor Jerry Sanders to declare a stage-1 water emergency this week, calling for a voluntary compliance “water watch,” Harris said.

 

Even as Sanders urges San Diegans to step up to the “20 Gallon Challenge,” returning figures show people throughout the city are using only 3 percent less water compared to past measurements, according to city documents.

 

City officials say that’s clearly not enough to stave off an impending water shortage because of statewide drought conditions and other factors.

 

“By declaring a water emergency, the mayor is letting people know that they’ve got to do more, that we are falling short on our water conservation efforts and that the longer-term outlook is one that requires more attention,” Harris said.

 

The City Council adopted the mayor’s declaration Monday, July 28, officially taking the city into a stage 1 alert.

 

While declaring a stage 1 cracks open the floodgates to future mandatory restrictions, City Attorney Mike Aguirre says the city should go directly to the next stage, which requires mandatory restrictions.

 

“The mayor and City Council have a legal duty to provide water to city residents. The City Council must adopt a new water conservation ordinance that requires the city to maintain a balance between supply and demand.” Aguirre said in a statement.

 

With California and much of the West in drought conditions, and judicial decisions that could limit access to water from the Sacramento/San Joaquin River Delta, city officials said there is a great need to increase public awareness — and action — to save more water.

 

Sanders’ declaration launches the city into the first stage of a four-stage water emergency system that begins with voluntary conservation that includes prohibitions on lawn irrigation, washing down sidewalks and overfilling private pools and water ornaments.

 

A stage 2 water alert makes all those cutbacks mandatory and applies “when the probability exists that the City of San Diego Water Utilities Department will not be able to meet all of the water demands of its customers,” according to the city’s municipal code.

 

Customers using reclaimed water to irrigate would not have to restrict usage, according to city code.

 

Many water-saving activities have already become part of daily life for water-savvy San Diegans. They include many familiar actions like taking shorter showers and decorating gardens with native vegetation that thrive in drier climates.

 

Keeping tabs on overfilling swimming pools and overirrigation of lawns have all been recommended by city officials over the years, but only now has the city taken official call to action.

 

San Diego’s restaurant industry has also been supporting the San Diego County Water Authority’s 20 Gallon Challenge campaign, which urges everyone to save 20 gallons a day through conservation efforts.

 

Restaurants supporting the movement on a volunteer basis don’t serve water unless customers ask.

 

But a stage 2 water alert would mandate such water restrictions at the dinner table.

 

For more information on city water conservation efforts visit www.sandiego.gov/water.#

http://www.sdnews.com/vnews/display.v/ART/2008/08/06/489a1f079f02e

 

 

 

Water supplies most urgent issue facing state

Ventura County Star- 8/7/08

BY Thomas D. Elias

 

Almost 20 years ago, the usually verdant Marin County, just north of the Golden Gate, suffered through a drought so severe that a ban on all new construction was considered, along with strict water rationing.

 

Things were worst there, but the rest of the state also had serious problems, as many cities passed laws against daytime lawn watering and "drought police" made rounds to enforce those regulations along with rules against watering down walkways, sidewalks and driveways.

 

Several wet years ensued, and Californians became relaxed again. But drought is back, despite a couple of wetter-than-usual months last winter. The rains and mountain snowfall of January and February were followed by a record-dry March and April, and by early May, snowpack in the Sierra Nevadas, the largest source of California water supplies, was at 67 percent of normal, down from 97 percent in February.

 

Add to that the court-ordered cutbacks of water shipments from the delta of the Sacramento and San Joaquin rivers east of San Francisco Bay, and you have a situation that could soon equal some of the worst droughts in the state's history.

 

Because almost everything in California depends on them, that makes water supplies the state's most pressing physical problem. It's true that voters will be asked to vote yes or no on everything from gay marriage to legislative redistricting and children's hospital expansions this fall. But ignore the need for water supplies and everything else becomes moot.

 

In the new drought, Marin County won't be feeling things first and worst. Improvements to that county's water system over the last 20 years allow it to catch and use more of its copious winter rainfall than before. Plus, Marin never hooked up with the state Water Project, unlike most other high-population counties, so it doesn't depend on supplies ultimately stemming from the Sierras.

 

This time, it's residents of the East Bay Municipal Water District feeling things first.

 

That district, serving residents from Berkeley to Danville and from the Carquinez Strait to Castro Valley in Alameda County, in May demanded a 20 percent cut on water use by its customers. That's the first water-rationing plan imposed anywhere in California since the early 1990s, when many cities and counties began demanding installation of low-flow shower heads and toilets not just in new construction, but even in existing homes and buildings.

 

The East Bay district expects its reservoirs to contain just two-thirds of their normal water by October, even with rationing. With great uncertainty about next winter's snowfalls, the district can't allow profligate use of supplies on hand.

 

Los Angeles is another place doing something about the shortage. After years of avoiding the subject of recycling wastewater, Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa now proposes that the state's largest city begin percolating treated sewage and other wastewater back into the region's underground water table, rather than sending it out to sea. The mayor also proposes financial incentives for high-tech conservation equipment in homes and businesses, things like waterless urinals, weather-sensitive sprinkler systems and porous parking lots to let more rainwater drain into aquifers.

 

But even if all that is accomplished, along with new restrictions on lawn watering and other water uses, it will take more to meet an expected 15 percent increase in demand by 2030.

 

All this means it's time for every part of the state to think seriously and creatively about water supply.

 

One positive suggestion came last spring from Democratic state Sen. Dean Florez of Shafter, who proposed setting up a $5 million hatchery to expand the population of delta smelt, the endangered, silvery minnow-like fish whose survival is the aim of the delta pumping reductions. Since January, farms and cities have lost more than 1 million acre-feet of water because of that cutback, water that has simply flowed out to sea when it might otherwise have been put to some use.

 

Breed enough smelt to end its endangered status, and part of the current water problem is solved.

 

Democratic Lt. Gov. John Garamendi summed up the situation well in an essay recently. "California must find new ways to operate its dams and water conveyance infrastructure to improve water supply reliability. Our efforts must also be cost-effective and innovative."

 

Those efforts plainly will have to include some kind of new storage facilities to save winter flood waters that ordinarily are wasted. Whether that should be new dams and reservoirs or expanded use of underground storage is a question whose answer cannot be delayed much longer without serious harm to people and businesses. There also should be strong consideration of desalinization plants to make use of ocean water, expensive as that might be.

 

The bottom line: California does not yet have a water emergency, but if global-warming forecasts have any merit, it will soon, unless some serious efforts to expand supplies begin very soon.

 

Thomas D. Elias of Santa Monica is a columnist and author. His e-mail address is tdelias@aol.com.#

http://www.venturacountystar.com/news/2008/aug/07/water-supplies-most-urgent-issue-facing-state/