With one of the highest costs for water in San Diego County, Padre Dam Municipal Water District has faced a lot of pushback from residents tired of expensive bills. But some relief is in sight. As of July 1, the district said, the average customer in its service area paid the third-highest cost for water in the county — just over $100 per month.
California utilities are restoring power to tens of thousands of customers after intentionally cuts due to extreme fire danger and Santa Ana winds, which may persist into Tuesday. Just over 31,000 customers remained without power in California early Tuesday morning, according to poweroutage.us. A woman was killed Monday morning when high winds blew a tree on a vehicle the woman was inside in Tustin, about 35 miles southeast of downtown Los Angeles in Orange County, KABC-TV reported.
The “devil winds” whipped San Diego County Monday, then quickly and mysteriously moved on, sparing the region the sort of hellacious horrors that the Santa Anas often bring in autumn. Having been told to brace for trouble, San Diegans collectively shrugged, sighed and went about their business. Most were unaware that the region was the beneficiary of timing and topography.
San Diego County will have enough water for 2019 in spite of low rainfall and high temperatures over the past year, the San Diego County Water Authority announced Monday. Rainfall during the 2018 water year, which ran from Oct. 1, 2017, to Sept. 30, totaled slightly more than three inches at San Diego International Airport, the county’s precipitation measurement site. SDCWA officials say that’s 67 percent lower than normal and the county’s second-lowest annual rainfall total since 1850.
In 2012, the California Legislature passed a law stating that it is a human right to have safe drinking water. But it provided only meager funds for that purpose. Proposition 3, a water bond on the November ballot, includes $750 million for safe drinking water and safe wastewater disposal in disadvantaged communities, and to eliminate lead from water fountains in schools. This is just one of many things Proposition 3 would accomplish by issuing $8.9 billion in revenue bonds to fund water projects in the state.
The rivers that once poured from the Sierra Nevada, thick with snowmelt and salmon, now languish amid relentless pumping, sometimes shriveling to a trickle and sparking a crisis for fish, wildlife and the people who rely on a healthy California delta. A state plan to improve these flows and avert disaster, however, has been mired in conflict and delays. And critical opposition is coming from an unexpected place: progressive San Francisco. City water officials worry that the far-reaching effort to revive hundreds of miles of waterways will mean giving up too much of their precious mountain supplies.
For Lisa Marie Harris, serving as the director of finance for the San Diego County Water Authority is far more than a job. It’s part of a calling that started in college. As an undergrad, Harris secured a fellowship to study public policy at the University of Michigan, which confirmed her desire to pursue a career in government finance. Today, she is responsible for overseeing the Water Authority’s $2.3 billion debt portfolio, developing the agency’s bi-annual $1.5 billion operating budget, and setting the agency’s annual rates and charges.
The winds notorious for fueling Southern California wildfires were expected to kick up for the first time this year on Sunday night, putting the region on alert, according to the National Weather Service. The season’s first major Santa Ana winds may reach gusts of up to 75 mph in the region’s mountains, creating critical fire weather conditions through Tuesday night. Last year, the winds drove the Thomas Fire, which destroyed more than 280,000 acres in Santa Barbara and Ventura counties. and took more than a month to contain.
Water veteran and community advocate Gloria D. Gray was recently elected chairwoman of the board of directors of the Metropolitan Water District (MWD) of Southern California. She has vast experience in state, regional and local water issues and has served as West Basin Municipal Water District’s (WBMWD) representative on the 38-member Metropolitan board since April 2009. “I am excited to help lead Metropolitan into the next era, as we work collaboratively to overcome challenges to our imported water supplies brought by climate change, invest in local resources and continue providing a reliable water supply to Southern California,” Gray said.
Water and agriculture go hand in hand. Growing food for the planet’s people consumes 70 percent of its freshwater sources. Therefore, water is not only life-giving, it is life-sustaining. Yet with climate change, population growth and development on watersheds, an estimated 2 billion people globally face limited access to clean water. And demand for water is expected to grow by 30 percent globally by 2050.
