California water regulators on Wednesday recommended tighter oversight of agricultural irrigation and a permanent ban on over-watering urban lawns, a first step toward developing a long-term conservation plan amid ongoing drought.
The proposal comes as nearly two-thirds of the state heads into a fifth year of severe drought despite a wet fall and heavy rains last winter that have ameliorated conditions in many areas.
One hundred and seventy percent of normal: It sounds so impressive.
But Stockton’s wet fall — mirrored across much of Northern California — doesn’t necessarily portend a wet winter.
The real test begins today, as we kick off the crucial months of December, January and February.
“Those are the three wettest months of the year, and that’s what’s going to make or break it,” said Jan Null, a meteorologist with the Golden Gate Weather Service in the Bay Area. It’s a tale of two states as California tries to pull itself out of a deep drought hole.
As the drought enters its fifth year, California is considering tightening its urban water conservation standards.
In a series of proposals released Wednesday, state officials said they might require urban water districts seeking to avoid state conservation mandates to prove they have a five-year water supply on hand.
Under rules that went into effect earlier this year, urban districts have to show only a three-year supply to get out from under the state’s previous mandates, which required savings of 25 percent.
Oklahoma Gov. Mary Fallin is emerging as President-elect Donald Trump’s leading contender for interior secretary, three people close to Trump’s transition team told POLITICO.
Fallin, a Republican who was in contention to serve as Trump’s vice president, has been the governor of Oklahoma since 2011. Before that, she served in the U.S. House. She also chaired the National Governors Association from 2013 to 2014.
Encinitas schools and homes gained millions of gallons of recycled water this week when the Olivenhain Municipal Water District launched a new distribution system for its Village Park Recycled Water Project.
The project, which started taking shape in spring 2015, can offset up to 14 millions of gallons of potable water use each year, officials said. It will eventually serve more than 20 schools and homeowner’s associations, and will bring the district’s total recycled water usage to 20 percent, said Kimberly Thorner, general manager of the district.
The City of Oceanside has started replacing old water and sewage lines in its downtown area. Some of the pipes are close to 100 years old, well past their life expectancy. This week crews are trenching Horne Street dropping in new lines made of polyvinyl chloride pipes. As part of $6.8 million project, the city will also replace hydrants, water meters and manhole covers. The work on Phase One of the project will last about a year.
The Olivenhain Municipal Water District celebrated the opening of the Village Park Recycled Water Pump Station Monday — a facility that will mean saving millions of gallons of water for the Encinitas area. The pump station itself is buried underground and is capable of pumping three million gallons of recycled water into the community every day, which is roughly 114 million gallons every year.
It seems simple enough: The State Water Resources Control Board, arbiter of equitable water use in California, wants to leave 40 percent of the water in three streams feeding the San Joaquin River south of Stockton. To the surprise of no one who follows this stuff, it’s more complicated than it sounds. Let’s ignore, for the moment, that the board has actually proposed a range of river flows from 30 percent to 50 percent, starting at 40 percent. I can only handle so much complexity, so we’ll just examine that 40 percent number.
The Association of California Water Agencies (ACWA) reports that the State Water Resources Control Board is expected to notify public water systems in the coming days regarding a new initiative to provide lead sampling to schools. Specifically, the State Water Board is expected to contact water systems this week with information about a statewide program that will require water systems to provide lead sampling services to K-12 schools upon request. The State Water Board also is expected to announce details about a webinar that will provide water systems with details about the initiative.
Asking the public to listen carefully to their controversial plan, state water officials began a series of hearings Tuesday on permanently shifting a share of water away from farms and cities and reallocating it to wildlife on streams feeding the San Joaquin River. Tuesday’s meeting was in Sacramento, but the board will next head to Stockton on Dec. 16 for a session at the Stockton Memorial Civic Auditorium. San Joaquin, Stanislaus and Merced counties have expressed strong opposition.
