[Water_news] 5. DWR'S CALIFORNIA WATER NEWS: AGENCIES, PROGRAMS, PEOPLE - 9/19/08

Department of Water Resources

California Water News

A daily compilation of significant news articles and comment

 

September 19, 2008

 

5. Agencies, Programs, People -

 

 

 

Save the oceans, save ourselves

The San Jose Mercury News- 9/18/08

 

Liquid justice: Shortage prompts city to consider a policing program to target water-wasters, but some experts see another way

Pasadena Weekly- 9/18/08

 

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

 

Save the oceans, save ourselves

The San Jose Mercury News- 9/18/08

By Steve Sorensen

 

Since man has inhabited the Earth common thought has been that the oceans are much too big to be affected by human action. The idea that the oceans are indestructible has met its end. Despite their size, the oceans are vulnerable to the same unsustainable trends that are degrading the terrestrial environment.

 

The impact we have had on ocean ecosystems has been vastly underestimated. Did you know only 10 percent of all large fish — both open ocean species including tuna, swordfish and marlin, and the large bottom fish such as cod, halibut, skates and flounder — are left in the sea, according to research published in the scientific journal Nature? And the state of California warns those big predatory fish are full of the toxins and other pollutants that we cast into the oceans. Plankton in the ocean generates more oxygen than land-based plants and the oceans remove carbon dioxide from our air. Bottom line, we don't take care of our oceans, we won't be around.

 

Millions of Californians enjoy the state's coast line and waterways every day — nine out of 10 will visit the beach at least once this year.

 

However, many of those people are unaware how their daily activities can impact the plants and animals off our shores.

 

Almost 90 percent of floating marine debris is plastic. Due to its durability, buoyancy and ability to absorb and concentrate toxins present in the ocean, plastic is especially harmful to marine life. Plastic marine debris affects most sea birds, fish and sea mammals, as they often mistake plastic for food. Some birds even feed it to their young. With plastic filling their stomachs, animals have a false feeling of being full, and may die of starvation. Sea turtles mistake plastic bags for jellyfish, one of their favorite foods. Even gray whales have been found dead with plastic bags and sheeting in their stomachs.

 

How does plastic get into the ocean? Look around the next time you walk down the street. When it rains, trash on sidewalks and streets accumulates in the gutters and is swept into our storm drain system. The storm drains dump into the bay and then is flushed to the ocean by the tides. Trash also may be dumped directly into the water by recreational and commercial boaters, and it is often left on the shores by beach-goers. A recent study found an average of 334,271 pieces of plastic per square mile in the North Pacific Central Gyre, a natural eddy system that concentrates material in the ocean.

 

How you can help keep the bay and ocean clean for your children and your children's children:

  Reduce, reuse and recycle at home, work and school.

  Buy products made from recycled materials with little or no packaging.

  Keep sidewalks, gutters and storm drains clean — they drain to the bay.

  Properly dispose of fishing lines, nets and hooks.

  Volunteer for Coastal Cleanup Day on Saturday. Go to www.coastal.ca.gov/publiced/ccd/ccd.html.

 

*Steve Sorensen is a 42-year resident of Alameda and a 25-year real estate broker at Harbor Bay Realty, an avid sea kayaker and responsible abalone hunter.#

http://www.mercurynews.com/alamedacounty/ci_10501626?nclick_check=1

 

 

 

Liquid justice: Shortage prompts city to consider a policing program to target water-wasters, but some experts see another way

Pasadena Weekly- 9/18/08

By Joe Piasecki

 

When the city declared a potential water shortage late last year, the Pasadena Water and Power Department launched a conservation campaign that grew to include stylish newspaper and bus-stop ads featuring mug shots of fictionalized water criminals.

 

"Wasting water is a serious offense," reads the caption underneath such dastardly characters such as Busted Sprinkler Bruno, Lawn Soaker Lana, Driveway Hoser Dave and Long Shower Larry, each representing a specific wasteful behavior that officials are asking residents to cease.

 

While these advertisements appear to get the conservation message across in a playful way — really, what could be taking teenage Larry so long? — they may also be preparing us for a time when people who do such selfish things would actually be treated as criminals.

 

On Monday, City Council members are expected to set a schedule of fines that, if put into effect at a later date, would make such activities as hosing off a driveway or watering a lawn during most daylight hours an infraction that could carry penalties of $50, $100, $200 or even $500. First-time violators, however, would be let off with a warning.

 

Much as in nearby sunbaked Azusa, which enacted water-waster fines in June, these new rules would be enforced by agents of the utility. Based on Azusa's experience, PWP predicted in a recent report to council members that it could cite as many as 25 first-time and six second-time violators per week, collecting more than $10,000 per year in fines.

 

With local drought conditions continuing, alternative sources such as the Colorado River also drying up and residents failing to reach a voluntary 10 percent reduction in water use, the day the water police may be knocking on your door could come sooner than you think, said PWP Water Division Director Shan Kwan.

 

"People aren't taking this seriously enough," said Kwan of the statewide drought proclaimed in June by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger. "We're going to have to have a long period of above-normal rainfall to catch up. If we continue not reaching the goal, we will probably have to go to [penalties] soon."

Conditions have already hit PWP customers' wallets.

 

Because underground wells (at historic low levels earlier this year) meet only 40 percent of Pasadena's water needs, PWP imports most of the water we drink and bathe with from other areas through the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California, which has been charging more because of limits on what it can pump out of the Colorado River and Sacramento Delta.

 

Residential water bills went up between $2 and $23 per month on July 1 and are expected to jump up at least another 4 percent next summer to keep up with imported water costs.

 

Despite all the bad news, some water experts believe there is a way Pasadena could reach its conservation goals without imposing fines and keep prices down for those who do their part.

Michael Hurley, chair of the city's Environmental Advisory Commission and a water resources manager with the environmental consulting firm Malcolm Pirnie, believes the city should adopt a budget-based water rate structure.

 

Like many other utility companies, PWP bases its water rates on meter size and actual usage. The larger your meter, the more you pay up-front — a type of "standby charge," explained Kwan, that covers the cost of having water ready to deliver through a big or small meter. When it comes to what people actually use, there's a tiered rate structure for each meter size that starts charging more per gallon after a certain level of usage is reached.

 

Switching to a budget-based rate structure would determine a reasonable amount of water use for each household and business in Pasadena by taking into account how many people are using water at the location and how much irrigation is required for the lot. Use less than your budget and pay a very low rate; go over your fair share and pay double or triple that rate, or more.

 

Using tiered rates alone, as Pasadena does now, is relatively ineffective for promoting conservation, according to an Orange County Grand Jury report that was released in May. The report advocates using water budgets to help Orange County reach its 10 percent conservation goal because tiered rates alone "have little impact or effect on a consumer who happens to be more focused on the rising cost of gasoline and food," as inefficient water use remains comparatively cheap. The report also found that water allotments under tiered rate structures are often too generous, and "may have little relevance to actual need or usage."

 

With the current rate structure, "You could have a one-inch meter on a small bungalow, a mansion and a business downtown, and from the billing data you're not going to get the information you need to set up a proper price signal [to encourage conservation and show people how much water they really should be using]," said Hurley, who formerly worked for the MWD.

 

If discussion drifts to budget-based rates during next week's council meeting, Hurley will have at least one supporter on the dais.

 

"Budget-based rates are already in use in a number of California cities, including Santa Rosa, Santa Barbara and Irvine," Councilman Steve Madison wrote in an email. "They would provide the most efficacious incentive — saving money — for all of us to use less water, a public resource that is in short supply."

 

Although there would be some up-front administrative costs to establish these rates, and citizens would have to adapt to the new rate system, "this is an idea that warrants serious consideration in Pasadena and I intend to continue to push for a consideration of this type of rate structure," Madison wrote.

 

Because of the work involved in coming up with an appropriate budget for each property, use of water budgets isn't widespread. But current drought conditions could change that, said Hurley, who also pointed to the success of the Irvine Ranch Water District, a water agency that switched to tiered budget-based rates in the early 1990s.

 

The Irvine Ranch Water District, which serves the city of Irvine and some surrounding areas, saw a 61 percent reduction in average landscaping water use between 1992 and 2005. And although average water use in Orange County is 190 gallons per person per day, Irvine Ranch customers use only 90 gallons per day on average.

 

For now, any decision on switching to a budget-based rate structure is on hold, pending results of a study looking at several alternative rate structures that will also take into account what it costs PWP to provide water for various types of customers, said Kwan. That study has been going on for several months, and could take another three or four, he said.

 

Meanwhile, a state grant is funding a separate study relating to water budgets, said Kwan. That project is looking at what kinds of formulas the utility could use to calculate water budgets for residential lots and businesses.

 

Studies aside, the future of water rates and what kind of penalties may await water-wasters are all policy decisions that will be made by City Council members, not the utility, said Kwan.

 

If Tim Brick, the city's longtime representative to the MWD and current chairman of its board of directors, has anything to say about it, these decisions will come as quickly as possible — and he fully supports enacting penalties as soon as possible.

 

"The budget-based approach takes into account the differences between users and would definitely have a conservation impact," he said, but "there's an immediate crisis that needs to be dealt with, and that's what penalties do. People blatantly wasting water need to be penalized for doing so."

Brick expects that next year the MWD will force the cities it serves to reduce by 10 to 20 percent the amount of water they import through that agency or face severe penalties — costs Kwan said would likely be passed on to PWP customers who use the most water.

Though Hurley isn't opposed to using penalties in the short term, he isn't hopeful they'll do much good on their own.

 

"These penalties alone are not going to create the level of savings that will allow us to get through a significant drought," he said.

 

"Conservation is always called for in reaction to threat of a drought, but if you have the right rate structure in place the message is consistent. It doesn't go away when conditions change; it becomes a lifestyle."#

http://www.pasadenaweekly.com/cms/story/detail/liquid_justice/6394/

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

DWR's California Water News is distributed to California Department of Water Resources management and staff, for information purposes, by the DWR Public Affairs Office. For reader's services, including new subscriptions, temporary cancellations and address changes, please use the online page: http://listhost2.water.ca.gov/mailman/listinfo/water_news. DWR operates and maintains the State Water Project, provides dam safety and flood control and inspection services, assists local water districts in water management and water conservation planning, and plans for future statewide water needs. Inclusion of materials is not to be construed as an endorsement of any programs, projects, or viewpoints by the Department or the State of California.