Just about every year, the San Diego County Water Authority uses ratepayer funds to bus local citizens to the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California’s final budget meeting in downtown Los Angeles. They are customers who have ended up with some unfortunate misimpressions about Metropolitan’s financial practices and proposed budget, and they come to urge Metropolitan to collect less revenue than what is proposed. And then the bus goes home.
Few people would be shocked to learn that the Los Angeles-based Metropolitan Water District is once again preparing to raise water rates and property taxes for the next two years, given its history of similar increases. What alarms me most is that Metropolitan is doing so using methodology that a state Superior Court judge has ruled illegal to collect money that it does not need using a process that lacks public transparency.
The Union-Tribune’s report on regional and statewide water conservation efforts (“Water conservation skid worsens across state,” April 5) omitted an important fact about the months-long effort of local residents and businesses to increase conservation — a fact that deserves to be recognized. We, as a region, saved enough water to successfully meet the state’s mandate for the initial emergency regulation period of June 2015 through February 2016.
Together, we reduced potable water use by 22 percent over this period compared to 2013 levels, outperforming the state’s aggregate target of 20 percent for the San Diego region.
Like other financially sound organizations, the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California has a robust budget process that provides fiscal stability while addressing current needs and long term objectives. This approach has resulted in the kind of essential investments to ensure the Southland has had reliable water supplies during this historic drought and prevented untold regional economic hardship — projects such as new water storage, local supply development, conservation rebates and innovative technologies.
Over the years, many of these initiatives were supported by the San Diego County Water Authority representatives on our board, though some were not.
With indications that water tables rose during winter rains, the Perris-based Eastern Municipal Water District’s Board of Directors Wednesday decided to lift some restrictions on outdoor water use.
“The time was right for us to act,” said EMWD Vice President David Slawson. “We sincerely appreciate our customers’ continued efforts during this unprecedented drought, and we look forward to making further adjustments as conditions continue to improve.”
New proposed permanent charges on treated water by the big seller of the commodity to Southern California could have an impact on Valley Center ranging from “significant to devastating,” according to local water chief Gary Arant.
San Diego County residents who have responded to Governor Jerry Brown’s mandates for cutting water use could find their water bills going up dramatically as a result as the supplier, the Metropolitan Water District (MWD, “The Met), thrashes around for a way to make up the money it is losing.
Even though San Diego water customers may be owed hundreds of millions of dollars by the region’s largest water supplier, it will be a long time before anyone sees a dime.
A judge ruled last year that the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California charged too much to deliver water to San Diego from the Colorado River. The judge said Metropolitan owes the San Diego County Water Authority at least $243 million, including legal fees and interest.
Los Angeles County will consider new water-saving requirements for developers and look at tax options to pay for future drought planning under a pair of measures adopted Tuesday.
Over the objections of business and development groups, the Board of Supervisors voted to have county staff start drafting a “net zero” ordinance that would aim to ensure that new developments do not increase overall regional water demand.
Helix Water District customers can now go back to watering their lawns three days a week starting April 6.
The Helix Water Board voted unanimously Wednesday to halt the two-days-only watering in effect since June 2015, when the state mandated that water districts require their customers reduce use by up to 25 percent.
Helix customers may choose which three days to water, but still must limit outdoor irrigation with spray sprinklers to no more than 10 minutes per station per day. That 10-minute limit does not apply to drip irrigation systems, rotating nozzle sprinklers, gear rotor sprinklers and weather-based controllers.
The MWD board is scheduled to vote April 12 on a rate proposal that would increase the cost of treated water for our region in 2017 by 62 percent and increase the cost of untreated water by 12 percent. The district’s public relation’s spin is that the “average” cost increase for its entire service area is 4 percent — but that number doesn’t apply to the San Diego County Water Authority. MWD’s methodology increases San Diego County’s costs while lowering costs for Los Angeles, without any rational basis for doing so.
