The electronic payment the Rainbow Municipal Water District made to the San Diego County Water Authority didn’t process by the date it was due, so Rainbow was assessed a late penalty. The fault was in the electronic processing rather than Rainbow’s lack of a payment attempt, so March 25, the SDCWA board unanimously approved a waiver of the penalty.
The water agencies in Fallbrook and Rainbow announced Thursday they will move forward with an effort to leave the San Diego County Water Authority and join the Eastern Municipal Water District in southwest Riverside County.
The Rancho California Water District received a nearly $3.5 million grant from the Federal Emergency Management Agency which will fund up to 75% of Phase 1 of the Vail Dam Hazard Mitigation Project. Phase 1 has already begun and includes pre-construction activities such as design, environmental compliance and permitting to upgrade the dam at Vail Lake, located east of Temecula.
The Fallbrook Public Utility District approved a contract with SCADA Integrations to upgrade the conveyor system at FPUD’s Water Reclamation Plant with a programmable logic controller system.
A 5-0 FPUD board vote Monday, March 22, approved the request for proposals submission from SCADA Integrations. The upgrade will be constructed in two phases, and the contract has a total value of $128,470.
The Rainbow Municipal Water District is planning to sell some of its property to fund the replacement of its current headquarters, but that will require prerequisites to have potential buyers interested in the land.
Rainbow has contracted with MasterCraft Homes Group, LLC, for a development study which is being performed in phases, and on March 23 Rainbow general manager Tom Kennedy provided the Rainbow board with an update on information which has been obtained from the study.
SRK Engineering received the Fallbrook Public Utility District contract to replace FPUD’s Gum Tree Pipeline.
The FPUD board voted 5-0 Monday, March 22, to award SRK a $428,500 contract, which matches the Escondido company’s bid. The work will replace approximately 1,400 feet of 20-inch diameter cement mortar lined and coated steel pipe along with associated appurtenances.
Representatives from three potable reuse projects currently under development in San Diego County will participate in the inaugural “Sustainable Building Week San Diego” at 11 a.m. on Tuesday, April 13.
Hosted by the San Diego Green Building Council, Sustainable Building Week offers free virtual events from April 12 – 16 addressing sustainable practices and creating collaboration and networks among San Diego professionals involved with environmental stewardship and green building. All events are free and open to the public.
A year ago, when stay-at-home orders were a newly disorienting fact of life, I started taking long walks through my neighborhood on L.A.’s Westside. Wandering south from Palms into Culver City, I realized I live near a huge concrete channel — a creek, trapped in place — with a bike path along the water, and a view of oil pumpjacks rising and falling atop the Baldwin Hills. There were beautiful murals, too, showing a healthy, thriving waterway. They were hashtagged #KnowYourWatershed. And the more I admired them, the more I realized that I did not, in fact, know my watershed, despite growing up not far from here.
After a series of meetings, the La Jolla View Reservoir project is taking a brief hiatus so the scope of what will be needed from La Jolla’s next reservoir can be determined. New findings are expected to be released in mid- to late April.
The San Diego County Water Authority is developing a water shortage contingency plan, though not implementing it, despite dry conditions in places from which the region imports much of its water.
The region draws about 20% of its water from local sources, including groundwater, desalinated seawater and local reservoirs, according to the Authority’s website. Fully one-half of regional water is imported, by various means, from the Colorado River. A minority proportion comes from Northern California.
