Tag Archive for: San Diego County Water Authority

Welcome to the Board-Vicki Quiram-Carlsbad

Welcome to the Board: Vicki Quiram, Carlsbad Municipal Water District

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(Editor’s Note: This feature highlights new members of the San Diego County Water Authority’s 36-member Board of Directors. Each of the Water Authority’s 24 member agencies appoints at least one representative to the Board, which sets policy for the Water Authority.)

Welcome to the Board: Vicki Quiram, Carlsbad Municipal Water District

Who: Vicki Quiram was seated on the San Diego County Water Authority Board of Directors on June 19, 2023, representing the Carlsbad Municipal Water District. Quiram serves on the Water Planning and Environmental and Imported Water committees for the Water Authority.

Background/Education: Vicki Quiram earned a Bachelor of Science Civil Engineering from the University of Texas. She is a Registered Professional Engineer (Texas) Public Works Leadership Fellow, a Envision Sustainability Professional, and holds a Masters Certificate in High Performance Leadership and Certified Life Coach. Quiram is a former Public Works Director and Assistant Director of Public Works for the County of Orange and the cities of Ventura and Westwood. She also served as New Hampshire Commissioner of Administrative and Environmental Services.

Water Industry Affiliations: North San Diego Water Reuse Coalition, American Water Works Association, American Public Works Association, and National Water Resources Committee.

Q & A

Q: How did you get interested in water issues?

A: My interest in water started as a little girl with a father that had a passion for water and took the family every Sunday on drives to water and wastewater treatment facilities 😊. Because of this instilled love for water, I later received my engineering degree with a focus on hydraulics and hydrology.  Since that time, I have had the wonderful opportunity to work in the water, wastewater, stormwater, flood control, watershed planning and environmental professions in both the private sector and city, county and state governments.  My passion for this industry has never stopped growing.  I am very fortunate to have experienced the excitement of seeing all water become One Water! My passion for the always-interesting, constantly-changing and challenging world of water will never end.

Q: What are your priorities or interests as a Board member?

A: I will prioritize the availability of a safe, reliable, and affordable water and recycled water supply for all customers that we represent. I will personally and professionally prioritize listening to and understanding the diverse needs and opinions of other board members and the extremely qualified Water Authority staff and will ask questions and work hard to make the best decisions possible for the region.

Q: Besides maintaining safe and reliable water supplies, what do you see as the top three issues facing the San Diego region?

A: Housing and Transportation; The maintenance and replacement of aging infrastructure; More extreme weather in the future and the difficulty of planning and being prepared for droughts, floods and other events that challenge the people’s housing and infrastructure.

Q: What do you like to do when you are not working?

A: Spend time with my husband, children and grandchildren; Camp, hike and be outdoors, Facilitate skills classes and mentor and coach women.

The Water Authority’s Board of Directors typically meets on the fourth Thursday of each month. The Board invites the public to attend its monthly meetings and to comment on agenda items or other matters before the Board. For meeting times, agendas and documents, go to​ www.sdcwa.org/board-directors

Opinion: California Shouldn’t Block Attempts to Help Struggling Rainbow, Fallbrook Farmers Survive

/in , /by /The San Diego Union-Tribuneby The San Diego Union-Tribune Editorial Board Mentioned: San Diego County Water Authority

For years, farmers in North County have warned they are imperiled by the high rates they have to pay the San Diego County Water Authority. Concerns are particularly acute among avocado growers within the Rainbow Municipal Water District and Fallbrook Public Utility District, where about 600 growers produce about 10 percent of the state’s crop on 5,300 acres.

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LAFCO Dissolves Detachment Advisory Committee

/in , /by /Fallbrook Village Newsby Joe Naiman Mentioned: San Diego County Water Authority

The detachment advisory committee San Diego’s County’s Local Agency Formation Commission created to address issues regarding the proposed detachment of the Fallbrook Public Utility District and the Rainbow Municipal Water District from the San Diego County Water Authority has been dissolved.

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The Other Real Reason San Diego Water World is Warring

/in , /by /Voice of San Diegoby MacKenzie Elmer Mentioned: San Diego County Water Authority

Rage Against the Machine’s “Take the Power Back,” is quickly becoming part of San Diego’s water wars soundtrack.

The power systems at play in that tune have nothing to do with California water politics. Nevertheless, its general message aimed at challenging oppressive systems sprang to mind while I watched Valley Center Municipal Water District board meeting last month.

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Small San Diego Water Buyers Vie to Usurp Big City Power

/in , /by /Voice of San Diegoby MacKenzie Elmer Mentioned: San Diego County Water Authority

Some of the region’s smaller, rural water buyers are fed up with how the city of San Diego’s been throwing its weight around recently and they see an opportunity to change things as the city scurries to stop two other agencies from defecting.

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Helix Water District Named Water Energy Leader with Energy Use Reductions

/in , , /by /Water News Network Mentioned: San Diego County Water Authority

Helix Water District received recognition from The Climate Registry as a Water-Energy Leader Gold organization after the district reduced its electric use by 15% and greenhouse gas emissions by 40%.

The Climate Registry is a nonprofit organization that helps companies, governments, and institutions reduce their emissions. Its Water-Energy Nexus Registry is sponsored by the California Environmental Protection Agency and allows utilities and cities to measure, track, and mitigate greenhouse gas emissions associated with California’s water system.

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Citizens Water Academy Returns for Summer 2023

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On June 27, the San Diego County Water Authority kicked off its first Citizens Water Academy since 2020, when COVID-19 forced a shutdown of the program. The academy offers attendees the opportunity to gain a deeper understanding of the Water Authority’s life-sustaining mission.

Participants learn firsthand about critical water issues affecting the region and go behind the scenes with water planners, managers, and engineers for an inside look at the water delivery system.

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Inspired by the San Diego County Water Authority's free landscape workshops, Vallecitos Water District employee Eileen Koonce transformed her own landscaping. Photo: Vallecitos Water District example watersmart landscaping

Free Landscape Workshops Convenient for Vallecitos Customers

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In partnership with the San Diego County Water Authority and the City of San Marcos, the Vallecitos Water District offers a series of five WaterSmart landscape design workshops in August and September to help its customers redesign and install new water-saving, sustainable landscapes at a convenient North County location.

Classes take place every other Wednesday evening from 5:30 p.m. to 8:30 p.m. starting August 2 at the Vallecitos Water District, 201 Vallecitos De Oro in San Marcos. The series is now open for registration at www.sdcwa.org/your-water/conservation/classes/. Scroll down to find the in-person course schedule or use the QR Code below. Prior registration is required.

Use the QR Code to access landscape design workshop information and to register. free landscape workshops

Use the QR Code to access landscape design workshop information and to register.

Plan ahead during summer months for fall installation

Summer is an ideal time to begin the workshop series. Participants who complete all five workshops receive a free visit to their home by a professional landscape architect to help them put a plan in place for installation during the cooler fall and winter months.

The Delaplanes received first place due to the addition of a working bioswale. Photo: Vallecitos Water District free landscape workshops

The Delaplanes received first place in the 2022 Vallecitos Water District landscape makeover contest due to the addition of a working bioswale. Photo: Vallecitos Water District

Residents in San Diego County have used the know-how from the free workshops to convert more than 1.5 million square feet of grass into beautiful, sustainable landscapes. They use less water and provide a lifestyle-friendly yard ideal for San Diego’s climate. New landscapes installed through the program have been proven to reduce water use by up to 37%.

Webinar topics cover residential landscape design for the homeowner, plant palettes, healthy soil, irrigation retrofits, and streamlined landscape maintenance. More than 8,000 San Diego County residents have taken these courses to date.

Low-water use plants, improved irrigation technologies, and WaterSmart classes reduce energy use, protect natural resources, and create beautiful outdoor living spaces as well as save water.

Save water, and save money with rebates

SLIDER

The Chens transformed their love for succulents into an award-winning landscape makeover. Photo: Vallecitos Water District

Landscape watering accounts for more than half of a typical household’s water use in California. WaterSmart workshops help residents create a drought-tolerant, water-efficient landscape with a design that maximizes enjoyment of the outdoor space. In addition, homeowners can save the time and expense required for ongoing maintenance of turf.

San Diego County homeowners may be eligible for between $2 and $4 per square foot to remove grass and replace it with low water-use plants better suited to our region’s hotter, drier weather. All customers are eligible for the base rebate of $2 per square foot. Residents in unincorporated San Diego County may be eligible for additional incentives through the Waterscape Rebate Program.

(Editor’s note: The Vallecitos Water District is one of the San Diego County Water Authority’s 24 member agencies that deliver water across the San Diego County region.) 

Politics Report: The Real Reason the Water Agencies Are Fighting so Hard

/in , , /by /Voice of San Diegoby Scott Lewis Quoted: San Diego County Water Authority

Eleven years ago, when the San Diego County Water Authority was going through the final stages of approving what had, by that time, become a decade-long odyssey to create the first desalination plant on the West Coast, the agency made a prediction.

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Valley Center Has Grown With its Water District

/in , , /by /Valley Roadrunner by David Ross Mentioned: San Diego County Water Authority

Making the desert bloom. That’s what our local water district has accomplished in the nearly 70 years of its existence.

Although settlers first came to Valley Center in the 1860s, the town’s population stayed at just a few hundred people throughout the first part of the 20th Century. On the eve of the formation of the district, the population was about 900, according to the Valley Center History Museum. But in 1954 the voters of the community voted overwhelmingly to create the Valley Center Municipal Water District (VCMWD). From then on, the town has grown with the water district, which made it possible to grow to the population it is today, around 22,000 (VCMWD’s total service area population is 29,700.)

What made that all possible was the creation of the San Diego County Water Authority (SDCWA) in 1944 and the completion of the 1st San Diego Aqueduct in the later 1940s’s. The Aqueduct’s purpose was to bring water from the Colorado River to San Diego County, from the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California (the “Met”) to provide something more than the area’s limited groundwater and streams that flowed during rainy seasons like we have had this year, but otherwise not so much.

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