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Water supplies in many parts of the state are seemingly better than they’ve been in recent memory. Major reservoirs in northern California are near capacity. The state water board lifted mandatory restrictions on urban water use. Some water agencies say they won’t be asking their customers to conserve this summer.

Obligatory restrictions may have gone by the wayside thanks to a little El Niño rainfall, but an important fact remains: California is in its fifth year of drought and, across the Central Valley, farmers and ranchers are struggling.

One Rancho Santa Margarita church, with help from its members and a few companies, is facing the drought head on.

In an effort to conserve, Community Lutheran Church plans to save an estimated 500,000 gallons of water per year with new landscaping and water use technology. Both were unveiled in front of a small crowd last week.

With work completed on the CLC Landscape Renovation Project, which broke ground in February, onlookers gazed at new native plants and trees surrounded by wood chips and gravel paths that replaced grass.

East County Magazine did a recent piece on Lake Morena and whether water levels were maintained too low to be a viable source of water for fire-fighting.  In the article, Billie Jo Jannen is quoted as saying if there’s a safety issue it needs to be examined.  Billie Jo is quite right.

But this is not the first time Lake Morena has been so low.  As an occasional fisherman out there, I’ve seen the shoreline covered with dead fish as the City transferred water down-system to the reservoirs closer in to the City. 

The San Diego City Council on Tuesday loosened some of its water restrictions, including limits on watering lawns, based on projections the city has enough water supply to weather continued drought.

The decision followed a similar move from the San Diego County Water Authority last month, which said it wouldn’t impose mandatory water use cuts through the end of January. The region already has enough water to meet demand through three more years of drought, according to the Water Authority.

The manager of the state’s electric grid released studies Tuesday that show its proposed expansion would yield annual consumer savings of as much as $1.5 billion by 2030 and help with the state’s goal of 50% renewable energy by then.

The California Independent System Operator, which produced the nearly 700 pages of reports under a mandate by state lawmakers, said expanding its operations to include more Western states would result in a more efficient electric grid system.