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Newly elected Helix Water District Board member Luis P. Tejeda has announced his resignation effective immediately. In an email letter to Board President Joel Scalzitti, Tejeda said he was stepping down because new business opportunities could present a conflict of interest in his role as a board member. Tejeda, who earned 5,636 votes in the district’s Division 1 area, beat Dan McMillan (5,451 votes), incumbent John Linden (3,963) and Aaron Zajac (795) in November. Division 1 customers live north of Interstate 8 in El Cajon, and include the Fletcher Hills and Bostonia neighborhoods.

A wet and snowy December may set the stage for what’s ahead this winter – or not. California’s winter is notorious for weather extremes. Some January’s have delivered abundant precipitation while others have been bone dry.
The latest map shows less of the state under extreme drought conditions mostly in the Central Valley and portions of Southern California. The water content of the Sierra Nevada mountain snowpack is at 72 percent of average for this time of winter. The snowpack usually is at its deepest and most water-laden around April 1st.

The slow but steady improvement in California’s drought picture should accelerate in the new year with a series of storms that are expected to dump rain and snow in Northern California. The northern half of the state has already seen impressive rains this fall and winter, filling reservoirs and replenishing the Sierra snowpack, a key source of water for California cities and farmlands.

In its first year of operations, the nation’s largest and most technologically advanced seawater desalination plant produced enough high-quality, drought-proof water from the Pacific Ocean to meet approximately 10 percent of the region’s demand. The Claude “Bud” Lewis Carlsbad Desalination Plant quickly generated significant benefits by relieving pressure on imported water supplies, reducing state mandates for emergency conservation measures in March and helping the region pass the state’s stringent water supply stress test in June. After completing construction on schedule, the plant was dedicated on Dec. 14, 2015, in front of more than 600 elected officials, community leaders and project partners.

Even before another rain storm brings more water between now and the Rose Parade, residents of Orange County can shout“Hurray!” for the County rising to the level of merely “extreme drought” from “exceptional drought.” Here is the official California Drought Map as of today, Thursday, Dec. 28, 2016: Last week’s map showed northwest Orange County still trapped in exceptional drought. A portion of south County preceded the remainder of the County in leaving the worst drought category.