Amid a third painfully dry year, the Bay Area’s biggest water retailer began releasing the names of customers using “excessive” amounts of water this week, a practice that may soon tee up hundreds of households for humiliation and shame.
Bakersfield’s two largest water providers will soon implement new restrictions to head off the potentially dire impacts of an extended drought.
On Dec. 14, the city of Bakersfield and California Water Service plan to limit the days customers can use water for outdoor landscaping. Other restrictions, like no longer automatically serving drinking water at restaurants, will also go into effect as officials attempt to meet or exceed Gov. Gavin Newsom’s call to reduce water usage by 15 percent.
An obscure farm-irrigation agency in the San Joaquin Valley, the Panoche Water District has been struggling with a monumental scandal the past three years, with top officials under criminal indictment for embezzling public funds and illegally dumping toxic waste.
It turns out the district has also been allegedly taking water from the federal government.
Earlier this year Panoche agreed to pay the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation nearly $7.5 million to compensate for “unauthorized diversion of water” from two federal canals, according to a settlement agreement obtained by The Bee.
