LA Ratepayers and Advocates Rally Against Runaway Rate Hikes, Demand Firing Of DWP Ratepayer Advocate For Siding With Utility, And Call On Mayor Eric Garcetti and City Council To Reject $2,000-$4,000 Delta Tunnels Tax and Rate Hike outside LA City Hall Monday.
A bipartisan federal bill was introduced Monday that aims to rehabilitate the Tijuana River Valley after a series of sewage spills in the area and to implement ways to prevent future spills. The Tijuana River Valley Comprehensive Protection and Rehabilitation Act of 2017, introduced at a news conference by Reps. Juan Vargas, D-San Diego, and Darrell Issa, R-Vista, would provide grant funding and develop a coordinated plan to update the area’s infrastructure to prevent the flooding of sewage, trash and sediment into the area along the U.S.-Mexico border.
Several groups converged at Los Angeles City Hall Monday with a demand: that the official advocate responsible for fighting for the interests of Department of Water and Power customers be fired. Many took issue in particular with his conclusions on a controversial $16 billion water tunnel project in northern California. Representatives of Consumer Watchdog and other groups say the utility’s official “ratepayer advocate,” Fred Pickel, has not been working on the side of customers. They have launched a campaign to oust him.
Some of the state’s biggest water districts are about to make their opening moves in a financial chess game that ultimately could saddle the Southland with much of the bill for re-engineering the failing heart of California’s water system. In coming weeks, the districts are expected to decide if they want to sign on to California WaterFix — a long-planned proposal to construct two massive tunnels that would change the way water supplies move through the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta.
With decision time approaching for water districts being asked to fund the most expensive water project in California history, the head of California’s largest water wholesaler Monday warned there is no room for subsidies or withdrawal from participation. “All of us have to work together to make this work, and all of us need to pay our share,” said Jeff Kightlinger, general manager of the Southern California Metropolitan Water District (MWD).
With decision time approaching for water districts being asked to fund the most expensive water project in California history, the head of California’s largest water wholesaler Monday warned there is no room for subsidies or withdrawal from participation. “All of us have to work together to make this work, and all of us need to pay our share,” said Jeff Kightlinger, general manager of the Southern California Metropolitan Water District (MWD).
Every day, I walk into the kitchen, turn on the faucet, and clean drinking water magically appears. It’s a miracle, really, and I’ll bet, like me, you don’t even think about it — the water always flows. Even in the years of drought we endured, good local water management and conservation got us through the tough times. The water always flows. But not all of Orange County’s water is from local groundwater sources.
Metropolitan Water District of Southern California: WHAT: The Metropolitan Water District of Southern California and the Sanitation Districts of Los Angeles County are launching a water recycling program that would purify treated wastewater to produce a valuable new drought-proof water supply. The Regional Recycled Water Program will start with a $17 million demonstration facility and could grow into one of the world’s largest water purification plants.
The Orange County Water District’s mission is to provide the 2.4 million people it serves with a reliable, adequate, high-quality water supply at the lowest reasonable cost in an environmentally responsible manner. Because of its dependence on climate-challenged, heavily regulated imported water, OCWD’s policy is to develop new local and drought-proof sources of water. In the process of doing this, OCWD has identified the proposed Huntington Beach Desalination Project as the single largest source of new local drinking water supply available to the region.
San Diego Unified School District is expected to announce new water testing policies Thursday in connection to the lead-tainted water found on several local campuses. The three-year program will involve testing all water outlets used for human consumption at district facilities. The sampling project will include early childhood education facilities and central offices, which were excluded from testing earlier this year. Water was at tested at 207 schools on district property beginning in April. Results showed 19 percent of the schools had some level of lead in the water.
