Nortek Security & Control LLC has moved its headquarters to a new, 82,000-square-foot building in the Atlas at Carlsbad complex in Carlsbad, where it operates its research, engineering, product development and executive offices. The company is a leader in smart connected devices and systems for residential smart home, security, access control, AV distribution, and digital health markets.
Like a bad penny, a plan to tax water keeps turning up in Sacramento. That’s right: under two proposals circulating in the Capitol, California would start taxing the most fundamental resource on the planet. Such taxes would needlessly drive up costs for families already struggling to make ends meet and undermine the very goals that proponents profess.
While looking for ways to optimize the San Diego region’s water supply, San Diego County Water Authority engineers realized the potential to link the new Olivenhain Reservoir with the existing Lake Hodges just to its east. Not only would connecting the lakes by a pipeline facilitate movemnt of Lake Hodges’ water through the regional distribution system, but the Water Authority could capitalize on a rare opportunity to generate electricity.
The resulting pipeline rises 770 feet from Lake Hodges to the Olivenhain Reservoir. Moving water uphill requires two 28,000-horsepower pumps sitting 10 stories underground. When water flows downhill through the same pipeline, it generates up to 40 megawatts of electricity, enough for 28,000 homes. The Water Authority generates power during the day when energy prices are highest. It pumps water back uphill at night when energy costs are lower, creating revenue in the process.
Completed in 2012, the Lake Hodges Projects facilities allow water stored in lake Hodges to be delivered to the Twin Oaks Valley Water Treatment Plant prior to distribution to a majority of the county. This also gives the Water Authority the ability to store 20,000 acre-feet of emergency water at Lake Hodges when the entire Emergency Storage Project is finished.
San Diego Unified found lead in water where it definitely should not be: coming from faucets with water filters on them. Last year, San Diego Unified found 38 schools with elevated levels of lead in their water. The district began replacing plumbing and fixtures and, in some cases, installing new water filters designed to remove lead. Lead is unsafe at any level and is especially damaging to children’s brains. Recently, though, the district has gotten results that show lead in newly filtered water. Samer Naji, a spokesman for the school district, said the results are a “head-scratcher.”
San Diego, Calif. – Business, civic, and water industry officials from across San Diego County have joined forces to oppose a proposed $135 million per year tax on drinking water in California that would harm ratepayers and likely result in a flood of additional taxes on the state’s most precious natural resource.
A coalition of business, civic and water industry officials from across San Diego County has joined forces to oppose a proposed $135 million per year tax on drinking water in California that would harm ratepayers and likely result in a flood of additional taxes on the state’s most precious natural resource.
During a news conference this morning at the County Administration Center, regional leaders offered other funding solutions to improve water quality in poor, rural areas of the state without adding another tax burden to residents in one of the nation’s most expensive states.
Supervisor Kristin Gaspar, chairwoman of the San Diego County Board of Supervisors, joined officials from the San Diego County Water Authority and several of its member agencies, the San Diego County Taxpayers Association, the Industrial Environmental Association, and several other groups. In all, more than 30 agencies and organizations across the region have signed a letter to legislative leaders opposing the drinking water tax plan.
Encinitas City Councilmember Mark Muir, chair of the San Diego County Water Authority’s Board of Directors and a member of the San Dieguito Water District Board, warned that the current water tax proposal would set a dangerous precedent. “It would be the camel’s nose under the tent; what begins as a modest increase could quickly grow larger and larger as more projects and programs try to get into the tent,” he said. “We’ve already seen proposals in Sacramento that could add more than $15 a month to residential water bills.”
The tax proposal is being advanced through Senate Bill 623 by state Sen. William Monning (Carmel) and a Brown Administration budget trailer bill related to safe drinking water. The drinking water tax would initially raise about $135 million a year to help provide clean, safe water in disadvantaged communities, mostly in the Central and Salinas valleys, where groundwater has been contaminated by farming operations. In addition, approximately $22 million would be generated by a tax on fertilizer and confined dairy facilities. State legislators are expected to vote on the tax by mid-June, though the issue could extend into late summer.
The Santa Fe Irrigation District board got a look on Thursday, May 17, at the water agency’s proposed budget for the fiscal year that begins July 1, a spending plan that calls for $30.8 million in operational costs and $10.4 million in capital projects. A public hearing is set for June 21 when the board can approve the final budget for the coming year. The budget anticipates an 8 percent increase in water sales, to 10,170 acre feet. The total includes 450 acre feet of recycled water. (An acre-foot is equivalent to 325,851 gallons).
It’s one thing to streamline environmental reviews for a major project, which happened for the Golden 1 Center in downtown Sacramento. It’s entirely another to dismiss any environmental lawsuits and prevent others from being filed. That’s what a Southern California congressman is trying to do, to clear the path for the highly contentious $17 billion Delta tunnels project. It’s an outrageous overreach on a slippery legal slope. Congress should reject it.
The Friant Kern Canal provides much of the water to valley crops, and it’s sinking. The November bond measure would pump 750 million in for repairs. The sinking has cut the canals carrying capacity in half. Fresno County has endorsed the measure. Supervisor Buddy Mendes says unlike Prop 1, the 2014 bond measure which failed to deliver enough funds to build Temperance Flat Dam, the funding in this plan is clear. “It’s specific language, and it has a series of what it will do, and one of the things is fixing of the Friant Kern Canal.”
The second and final phase of reconstruction continues at the Oroville Dam spillways. This year, contractor Kiewit Infrastructure West Co. is rebuilding the top 730-foot portion of the main spillway and using structural concrete to rebuild the walls and resurface the chute in the middle. A flight over the location last week during a break in Butte County Sheriff’s Office helicopter training exercise, showed that much original concrete at the top of the chute has been removed, along with the walls.
The Water News Network is San Diego County’s source for water news and information.
