While water rates have increased in the past few years, it’s been longer since wastewater rates changed.
“We have not had an increase in over a decade, more than 10 years,” said Shauna Lorance, director of the city of San Diego’s Public Utilities.
Drinking water rates did increase about two years ago, and under this proposal, they will likely be going up another 2%. The biggest change will be for wastewater charges.
In case you hadn’t heard, California is once again in a drought.
But don’t take our word for it. The pictures tell a chilling (or, rather, incrementally heating) story. Boat slips on dry land. “Bathtub rings” around lakes. Juvenile salmon cooked to death in warming rivers. And the U.N.’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change issued a report on Monday that outlines just how much damage has been done and who’s to blame: “It is a statement of fact, we cannot be any more certain; it is unequivocal and indisputable that humans are warming the planet.”
San Diegans will have many opportunities to ask questions and provide feedback regarding proposed water and wastewater rate increases.
This week, all city water and wastewater customers will receive a Proposition 218 notice in the mail offering information about the proposed rate increases and an upcoming public hearing on Sept. 21. The notice is available in multiple languages online.
The city of Roseville plans to take 1.2 billion gallons from its wells to supply about 53,000 households with running water this summer.
State reservoirs have receded to their lowest point in years. To prepare for dry seasons, Roseville has invested in new technology to boost its groundwater supply by ingesting water from previous snowmelt and rainy seasons into underground wells so when water is most needed, the city isn’t entirely reliant on Folsom Lake.
The “bathtub ring” at Lake Mead has become a familiar sight. The water level in the lake is the lowest it has been since the Hoover Dam, which created the lake, was built in the 1930s. Those low levels have been decades in the making.
“Back in around 2000, Lake Mead was pretty close to being full, but over the last 20 years-plus now we’ve just not had good hydrologic conditions. It will take years to recover from that, years of good conditions and unfortunately the climate models and projections don’t predict us getting cooler and they don’t predict us, let’s say, getting wetter,” said Dr. Sharon Megdal, University of Arizona professor and former board member for the Central Arizona Project.
A prolonged 21-year warming and drying trend is pushing the nation’s two largest reservoirs to record lows. For the first time this summer, the federal government will declare a shortage.
The Colorado River is tapped out.
Another dry year has left the waterway that supplies 40 million people in the Southwest parched. A prolonged 21-year warming and drying trend is pushing the nation’s two largest reservoirs to record lows. For the first time this summer, the federal government will declare a shortage.
Climate change is exacerbating the current drought. Warming temperatures are upending how the water cycle functions in the Southwest. The 1,450-mile long river acts as a drinking water supply, a hydroelectric power generator, and an irrigator of crop fields across seven Western states and two in Mexico. Scientists say the only way forward is to rein in demands on the river’s water to match its decline.
Imperial Irrigation District officials are making a last-ditch effort to amend or kill proposed legislation that could fundamentally transform the governing board of the agency, Assembly Bill 1021.
At the heart of the issue is how the bill could force the district — which provides water and power to virtually all of Imperial County, and electricity to part of the Coachella Valley — to add a seat representing energy ratepayers from a small section of southeastern Riverside County to the IID Board of Directors.
IID officials are vehemently opposed to the bill, which they see as the tip of a spear that would allow outside interests to seize control of Imperial Valley’s lifeblood, its water.
Drought-stricken reservoirs and rivers in Northern California mean painful water cutbacks for farmers and towns. Some are trying hard to conserve to avoid even worse to come.
Gov. Jared Polis formally declared a drought emergency Friday for almost two dozen western Colorado counties. Colorado’s Drought Task Force, Agriculture Impact Task Force and Municipal Water Task Force will remain active and responsive to local needs, a release from the Colorado Water Conservation Board states Friday. Moffat, Routt, Jackson, Rio Blanco, Grand, Garfield, Eagle, Summit, Mesa, Delta, Pitkin, Gunnison, Montrose, Ouray, San Miguel, San Juan, Hinsdale, Dolores, Montezuma, La Plata and Archuleta counties are included in the declaration.
