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The city next week will be mailing out notices regarding a public hearing on Jan. 10 on proposed increases in water rates. Residential rates are proposed to increase by 7.75 percent for water used, plus an 8.75 percent hike in the fixed meter charge. The City Council, meeting in a workshop session Tuesday night regarding water rates, was told most of the “water commodity” rate increase reflects a pass-through increase from the San Diego County Water Authority, from where the city buys raw water for treatment in its municipal plant.

Sacramento, California – Assemblymember Eduardo Garcia is pleased to report that the California Wildlife Conservation Board appropriated $14.5 million at yesterday’s hearing dedicated to the Salton Sea. The board voted to approve a grant allocation to the California Department of Water Resources for a cooperative project to construct 640+ acres of wetland habitat, including deep-water channels, shallow ponds, and nesting structures to enhance habitat for fish eating birds, on the edge of the Salton Sea at the terminus of the New River located seven miles northwest of the City of Westmorland in Imperial County.

 

Residents and officials living near California’s Salton Sea skewered the state water board in Sacramento on Tuesday for dragging their feet to solve the lake’s steady shrinking.

“You assigned a task force to address this problem, but neither the task nor the force were sufficient to meet the scope of the problem,” Imperial Irrigation District general manager Kevin Kelley told the five-person State Water Resources Control Board. “The state has dithered and called it due diligence. We have a ticking time bomb and you’ve treated it like a beach ball at a backyard picnic.”

 

Do you own a property with a well in San Diego County? Is it dry due to the prolonged statewide drought? Help is available. A new emergency water distribution program is offering assistance to residents without access to running water for drinking and sanitation due to a dry well. Residents who qualify can receive low-interest loans to replace individual water well systems and install temporary water tanks. The water assistance is not for landscaping or agricultural needs. The program was created as a result of an executive order by California Governor Jerry Brown.

La Nina has arrived and could hang around through winter, government weather forecasters said Thursday. La Nina, the flip side of El Nino, is the periodic cooling of the central Pacific Ocean that affects weather patterns around the globe. Predictions called for fleeting La Nina conditions that could last through February. It’s “anticipated to be a weak, short-lived event,” said Mike Halpert of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Climate Prediction Center.