Story on CA Water Conservation (Aub Jnl)
Sticking Inland California Residents with the Water Bill
It is vital that state lawmakers craft, in an open and deliberative way, legislation that will help ensure a more reliable water supply for residents, farmers, fishermen, and job-creating business owners. However, the California Legislature has, too often in the past, enacted simplistic, top-down laws that caused more harm than good.
During the contentious and complex water debate that has taken place over the last month, not enough attention has been paid to the inequitable and impractical 20% water conservation mandate that first appeared in AB 49 (Feuer) and is now included in draft amendments to SB 68 (Steinberg), as circulated by his staff. There is no debate about the need for properly aligning incentives to ensure that residents, business owners and farmers use water efficiently. In my first job out of college, I worked as a water conservation coordinator for the City of Ontario in Southern California. I visited homeowners and helped them save water in smart and practical ways.
But SB 68 is incredibly unfair to those who live in the hotter and drier inland areas of the state. The bill would ultimately force most water agencies in Northern and Inland California to raise water rates and/or ration water to their homeowner and small business customers while those who live in coastal communities would make little or no sacrifice. It is as if those who live in the inland areas are being blamed for the problems in the Delta.
How would this occur? The bill contains a loophole large enough for the Delta King to steam through. While SB 68 mandates that most water agencies in the state set water use targets that reduce per capita use by 10% by the end of 2015 and 20% by the end of 2020, Section 10608.22 of the bill provides a huge loophole for communities on the coast. According to an analysis by the Placer County Water Agency (PCWA) of the draft language that will be included in SB 68, San Franciscans would likely be exempt from the 20% water conservation mandate altogether since Section 10608.22 provides a exemption for any agency with a residential per capital use of 100 gallons per day or less. According PCWA also, estimates based on draft water conservation targets developed by the Department of Water Resources (DWR), that residents in the large cities of Los Angeles and Long Beach would be required to cut their water use by only 5% by 2020. In contrast, cities in much hotter and drier climates, like Sacramento and Fresno would have to comply with the stringent 20% standard. Placer County, where I live, would be in the same boat. Is there power politics at work? This is outrageously unfair. With huge exemptions for some of our state’s largest cities, how would the state as a whole achieve the 20% water conservation goal by 2020? Wouldn’t a greater burden eventually fall on the inland cities and counties to make the 2020 deadline?
To meet stringent 20% water conservation standard, many water agencies will have to either massively lower demand by raising customer waters rate by 20%, 30%, or 40% or more or by rationing. This is unfair to water agencies that already have strong, built-in incentives to improve water efficiency. Take the case of Placer County. The five elected members and professional staff of the Placer County Water Agency (PCWA) have poured tens of millions of dollars into enhancing the local water supply and increasing water efficiency. If the elected directors don’t do a good job in conserving water, they get thrown out of office. PCWA has a number of programs and rebates to encourage the installation of water efficient washing machines, toilets and irrigation systems.
The top-down 20% conservation mandate may be impractical. Article XIIIB of the California Constitution (Proposition 21 prohibits a water agency from imposing water rates that are greater than the costs of providing the water service. Does the author of SB 68 expect water agencies to achieve the 20% conservation mandate through permanent rationing? The next thing you know, we will have the Water Police patrolling our neighborhoods. There has got to be a better way.
On October 5, Senator Steinberg briefed a number of city council members and county supervisors who serve on the Sacramento Area Council of Governments (SACOG) on the provisions of SB 68. I appreciated his willingness to take the time to brief us and to take our questions. Several SACOG members raised important questions about how SB 68 would effect Sacramento and the Delta counties. I joined my colleague Lincoln City Council member Cosgrove in raising questions about the fairness and practicality of the 20% conservation mandate. I believe that a better approach is for each water agency to implement Best Management Practices or BMPs to ensure that all of us use this precious resource wisely. Instead of more top-down mandates from the state, let’s hold our locally elected water agency officials accountable for ensuring a reliable water supply and investments to increase water efficiency every year.
Kevin Hanley serves on the Auburn City Council and on the Sacramento Area Council of Governments.
When all else fails, put down the pole and swim with the dog.
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