[Water_news] 1. DWR'S CALIFORNIA WATER NEWS - Top Items for 5/15/09

Department of Water Resources

California Water News

A daily compilation for DWR personnel of significant news articles and comment

 

May 15, 2009

 

1.   Top Item–

 

Ground broken on state's largest ultraviolet water plant

The Stockton Record – 5/15/09

By Alex Breitler

 

TRACY - San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom climbed onto the rubber-tired backhoe and fiddled with the levers. Before the machine roared to life, he turned to San Joaquin County Supervisor Leroy Ornellas and said:

 

"For the record, supervisor, I have OSHA-approved hair. My old hard hat is right here," pointing to his famously-slicked mane.

 

And with that bit of self-deprecating humor, Newsom turned earth on a $112 million water treatment plant which - combined with a larger-scale upgrade of San Francisco's water supply infrastructure - will create an estimated 2,300 construction jobs in San Joaquin and Stanislaus counties.

 

A liberal, big-city mayor and would-be governor might have little in common with a right-of-center county supervisor and dairyman, but for one day at least Newsom and Ornellas were allies. They sat arm-to-arm during Thursday's groundbreaking ceremony on golden fields south of Tracy, and, when it was over, shared a laugh or two.

 

"We're buds now," Ornellas said with a smile, linking two fingers. "We're like this."

 

Many people don't realize that San Francisco's waterworks run through the southwestern portion of the county, part of a complicated linkage of canals and tunnels bringing Sierra Nevada water to the Bay Area.

 

The treatment plant - the largest in the state to use advanced ultraviolet technology - will clean that water before it flows to the taps of 2.4 million people.

 

The construction of new water facilities by a big city could easily be cause for alarm in water-aware San Joaquin County.

But the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission last year put off for one decade a controversial plan to increase the amount of water it takes from the Tuolumne River, water that otherwise could flow into the Delta.

 

Increased demand will be met instead through water conservation, recycling and groundwater, said Ed Harrington, general manager of the commission.

 

"It's the right balance," he said.

 

Ornellas said he was not concerned about the water unless San Francisco planned to take more of it. He said San Joaquin County was "proud and happy to have this project."

 

Newsom has shown willingness to move his gubernatorial campaign into conservative territory. He held a town hall meeting in Fresno at the end of April, his first after announcing his candidacy for governor. He also visited Stockton's University of the Pacific in February.

 

"Anyone who is going to run for governor has to be willing to come into an area and talk to us," Ornellas said. "I'm glad he came."

 

Newsom said it was important to build trust between coastal regions and the Valley and said Thursday marked the beginning of a new partnership.

 

"We are lamenting, all of us ... some of the budget challenges we face," he said. "We have to focus on the economy, create jobs and create opportunity. That's exactly what we're doing."

 

On water, he said he opposes tearing down the Hetch Hetchy dam as some environmentalists have proposed. For a Delta fix, he said, "everything has to be on the table," including a canal that would move water around rather than through the estuary.

 

Work on the new treatment facility is expected to last about two years. While few permanent jobs will result from rebuilding San Francisco's waterworks, the projects will create work in San Joaquin County through 2011 and Stanislaus County through 2013, officials said.

 

"It couldn't come at a better time," Ornellas said.#

 

http://www.recordnet.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20090515/A_NEWS/905150333/-1/rss14

 

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