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Merle Aleshire Retires From VCMWD Board Of Directors

/in /by /Valley Road Runner

Long-time Valley Center Municipal Water District Director, Merle Aleshire, will retire after 20 years  from the water agency’s Board effective December 30, 2017. Representing Election Division 5 (covering the Meadows, Welk’s, Jesmond Dene), Aleshire joined the Board in December of 1997, filling the unexpired term of his predecessor.  He successfully stood for re-election in 1998, 2002, 2006, 2010, and 2014.  His current term expires at the end of 2018.

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Environment Report: Water Authority Extends Controversial Deal By A Decade

/in /by /Voice Of San Diegoby Ry Rivard Quoted: Dan Denham

The San Diego County Water Authority extended by 10 years a multibillion-dollar deal it has to buy water from the Imperial Irrigation District. That deal remains the largest water purchase of its kind in the United States. The Water Authority began talking about the deal in 1995, shortly after a major drought hit the state. The Water Authority pays Imperial County farmers to stop using some of the Colorado River water they have rights to and, in turn, San Diego gets long-term access to enough water for roughly 1.6 million city folk.

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Lessons From Disastrous Wine Country Fires Helped In Battling Southern California Infernos

/in /by /Los Angeles Times

Both sieges began in darkness with fierce winds that made the flames impossible to stop. Hurricane-force gusts pushed the flames over highways that should have been barriers and into neighborhoods so quickly that officials said they were helpless to protect the homes in their path. The wine country fires that ravaged Northern California in October and the firestorm in Southern California this month have capped the most destructive year for fires in state history.

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San Diego Again Offering Money To Help Make Your Lawn Drought Resistant

/in /by /KPBS

Friday is the deadline for San Diego residents and business owners to apply for a rebate from the city for removing grass and replacing it with drought tolerant landscaping. The turf rebate program was very popular in the height of the drought. In past years, the money was used up immediately. This year, the city opened applications for rebates for two weeks in October and had 120 takers, said Brian Hojnacki, a management analyst with the city’s Public Utilities Department.

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The Salton Sea Is Dying – We Can’t Let That Happen

/in /by /Sierra Magazine

WHEN THE DUST RISES IN NORTH SHORE, a small farmworker town at the edge of the Salton Sea, Jacqueline Pozar’s nose often starts to bleed. Then her teacher at Saul Martinez Elementary School in nearby Mecca calls her mom, Maria, and asks her to come pick up her daughter. Jacqueline is seven years old. “I feel really bad because I can’t do anything for her,” Maria Pozar says.

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South San Diego County Beaches Getting More Water Testing

/in /by /KPBS

Cross-border sewage spills got the attention of the San Diego Chapter of the Surfrider Foundation, and grant funding helped them launch a clean water campaign that will lead to more testing of south county ocean waters. Massive sewage spills have created a public health problem that appears headed to federal court because several municipalities are suing to stop the pollution. The new water testing is made possible because of a grant from the San Diego-based group Las Patronas. That grant allows Surfrider to buy two water quality testing labs.

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Public Hearing Tuesday On Higher Poway Water, Sewer Rates

/in /by /The San Diego Union-Tribune

A busy agenda for Tuesday night’s City Council meeting includes a public hearing on proposed water and sewer rate hikes and a negotiating agreement with two developers interested in building within Poway Road’s newly-designated Town Center. The council is proposing water rate increases of 3.5 percent for water use and 5.5 percent for the fixed water meter charge. Sewer rates are proposed to increase by 4.5 percent and the fixed sewer charge is slated to rise by 4.75 percent.

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Water-Rights Lawsuit Ends After 66 Years

/in /by /The San Diego Union-Tribune

After 66 years of litigation and more than 50 years of settlement talks, the longest-running federal civil case in San Diego has ended. The Fallbrook Public Utility District board of directors voted unanimously Monday to end a water dispute with the U.S. government over rights to water that flows from the Santa Margarita River. “After eight years of my time here, and many more years of other people’s time before that, we are at the point where we have a final agreement with Camp Pendleton on the Santa Margarita,” the district’s acting general manager, Jack Bebee, told directors.

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To Desalinate or Not to Desalinate: UCI Debate Over Controversial Proposed Huntington Beach Plant

/in /by /Voice of OC (Santa Ana) Quoted: Jeremy Crutchfield

Academics, advocates and activists met for a panel discussion at UC Irvine to hash out the pros and cons of a proposal to build a desalination plant in Huntington Beach, with environmentalists once again warning it would damage marine environments and raise water bills. “There is nothing simple about desalination,” said panelist Ray Hiemstra, associate director of Orange County Coastkeeper, an environmental organization focused on water quality. Coastkeeper went to court in November to challenge approval for the project granted in October by the State Lands Commission. Additional approvals still need to be secured for construction to begin.

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Lessons Learned? Lilac Fire Tested Strategies Drawn From ’07 And ’03 Fires

/in /by /The San Diego Union-Tribune

After more than a decade of studying wildfires, San Diego County took its final exams last week. Did we pass? Authorities say the region is far better equipped to handle swift, wind-whipped flames than it was during the firestorms of 2007 and ’03. “We’re about $460 million more prepared,” Supervisor Dianne Jacob said Friday, “both on the ground and in the air.”Officials cited better communication between fire agencies; more fire engines and air tankers on the front lines, day and night; and better tracking of the flames.

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