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San Diego County Water Authority Seeks Rate Relief at MWD

With the recession and the COVID-19 pandemic causing economic havoc nationally and across Southern California, the San Diego County Water Authority has adopted several cost-cutting strategies to reduce rate increases and it’s asking the Los Angeles-based Metropolitan Water District of Southern California to do the same.

San Diego County Water Authority Board of Directors Chair Jim Madaffer-primary-View from the Chair

Help Us Reduce Water Rates

As my two-year term as the Water Authority Board chair winds down, it’s my pleasure to update you on two important efforts that are underway for the betterment of the San Diego region.

First of all, our Board voted unanimously last week to spend a few more months discussing and assessing a study of a new regional water conveyance system to deliver our high-priority Colorado River supplies from the Imperial Valley. The work we’ve done over the past year shows the project would produce billions of dollars in potential savings over several decades – and we plan to use the next few months to outreach to stakeholder communities about this study, address questions raised in recent weeks and seek Board direction in November.

Ultimately, the questions are bigger than a new aqueduct – they are about how we sustain our economy and quality of life at a reasonable cost. A new multi-benefits conveyance system is one potential solution – but if not that, then we must grapple with equal intensity over whether it makes sense to pay ever-increasing costs (over which we have no control) to the Los Angeles-based Metropolitan Water District of Southern California to deliver our water for generations, or whether a plan based mainly on local water generation is financially feasible.

The other big issue this month is related – my request that MWD adopt rate relief measures this fall that reduce our water costs. Put simply, despite the recession and the COVID-19 pandemic MWD has not enacted the same kind of rate relief as the Water Authority, which froze hiring, deferred non-essential projects and significantly reduced travel – among other steps. In the end, we limited rate increases to 4.8-4.9 % for 2021 – and more than 60% of that is directly attributable to MWD.

Now, we’re asking MWD to take a similar approach, recognizing that we’re all in this together. We aren’t prescribing the strategies for MWD. We’re just asking that the nation’s largest water agency help its customers, and we’re pledging that any rate relief MWD provides will be passed directly to our member agencies. You can view the letter I sent to MWD at www.sdcwa.org/support-rate-relief-mwd.

I invite you to help move this conversation forward by encouraging MWD to find meaningful cost savings this fall that are reflected in its budget. Please take a moment to do so at www.sdcwa.org/support-rate-relief-mwd by submitting a letter of support for rate relief.

View From The Chair represents the viewpoints of Jim Madaffer, Chair of the San Diego County Water Authority Board of Directors.
San Diego County Water Authority-Rate Relief-MWD-COVID-19

San Diego County Water Authority Seeks Rate Relief at MWD

With the recession and the COVID-19 pandemic causing economic havoc nationally and across Southern California, the San Diego County Water Authority has adopted several cost-cutting strategies to reduce rate increases and it’s asking the Los Angeles-based Metropolitan Water District of Southern California to do the same.

When the Water Authority’s Board of Directors approved its 2021 rates in June, it limited rate increases to 4.8-4.9% – and more than 60% of that rate increase is directly attributable to MWD. The Water Authority Board also directed staff to return this fall with any other cost savings, specifically, any pass-through savings from MWD.

Water rates and COVID-19

So far, MWD’s Board has directed agency staff to look for cost-cutting measures – but MWD staff is proposing not to offer further rate relief.  Even though MWD is proposing to initiate cost-containment efforts to save $11.7 million in FY2021 (less than 0.6% of its budget), MWD’s September rate review memo recommends not to incorporate the savings into its budget and not to offer rate relief because it found member agencies “have not experienced significant [financial] impacts attributable to COVID-19.”

Water agencies face financial pressure

In reality, San Diego County and the nation continue to face a recession and double-digit unemployment, and many water agencies across Southern California are facing financial pressure due to unpaid bills by residents and their own efforts to provide rate relief.

In response to those unprecedented pressures, the Water Authority froze hiring, limited travel and training, and delayed equipment replacement, among other efforts.

“The Water Authority Board believes that it is important for all water suppliers, including MWD, to be recognized as part of the solution for Southern California ratepayers during this difficult time,” said Jim Madaffer, chair of the Water Authority’s Board of Directors. “MWD has an opportunity to help millions of ratepayers by tightening its belt like the Water Authority and numerous other water agencies have already done.”

Nation’s largest water agency has opportunity to help ratepayers across Southern California

Madaffer wrote a letter to MWD’s Board chair this week encouraging the nation’s largest water agency to take additional cost-saving steps. One way MWD could benefit all member agencies would be to reduce its water transportation rates by $15 per acre-foot. This would trim MWD’s budget by about 1.3% and provide $24 million in savings to Southern California water agencies.

However, Madaffer said the Water Authority is open to other ways that MWD can cut costs and reduce rate increases.

“We want to be clear that it also is not our intention to impede in any way MWD’s ability to provide a safe and reliable water supply to its member agencies – to the contrary, we believe these cost savings may be achieved without having any material impact on service,” Madaffer said.

To read Madaffer’s letter and submit a letter of support for rate relief to MWD, go to www.sdcwa.org/support-rate-relief-mwd.

EPA Announces Short-Term Projects to Plug Border Sewage Flow

Emphasizing the “unprecedented” bipartisan cooperation between local and state governments, Border Patrol and the International Boundary & Water Commission, EPA Administrator Andrew Wheeler announced short-term projects Wednesday to plug the international sewage flow across the U.S.-Mexico border.

Its Electric Grid Under Strain, California Turns to Batteries

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FPUD Approves Additional LAFCO Deposit

San Diego County’s Local Agency Formation Commission requires a deposit to process applications to LAFCO for jurisdictional changes, and the Fallbrook Public Utility District will be providing an additional deposit to process the application for FPUD to detach from the San Diego County Water Authority and annex into the Eastern Municipal Water District.

A 5-0 FPUD board vote, Monday, Aug. 24, authorized an additional $62,220 deposit to LAFCO. The deposit is expected to cover an additional 510 hours of LAFCO staff time at LAFCO’s rate of $122 per hour.

California Legislature’s End-of-Session Scramble Leaves Environment Bills on Cutting Room Floor

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Among them was the majority of the environmental agenda in what some legislators, environmentalists and public health advocates labeled a disappointment.

An Extraordinary Summer of Crises for California’s Farmworkers

Rosa Villegas woke up at two in the morning on a late August Monday to make her way to the lettuce fields in California’s south Salinas Valley, where she was scheduled to start bagging heads of romaine at 4 a.m. The sky overhead wasn’t its usual dark, star-dotted self as she walked to her car. Instead, it glowed a sickly red, colored by the fires burning on the flanks of the Santa Lucia mountains, just a few miles west.

Can Community Microgrids Fill the Gap in California’s Plans for 100% Renewable Energy?

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Top EPA Official Promises Short-Term Fixes to Tijuana Sewage

In a rare California appearance for President Donald Trump’s appointed Environmental Protection Agency leader, Andrew Wheeler promised the region millions in funding this budget cycle for some quick-er fixes to the age old Tijuana River sewage crisis.