The state Water Resources Control Board voted to end mandatory conservation of up to 36 percent in many communities, moving instead to a system under which only regions where a shortage of supply is anticipated will have to conserve.
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“Californians stepped up during this drought and saved more water than ever before”, Gov. Jerry Brown (D) said in a prepared statement quoted by the Post.
The state board set a June 22 deadline for each district to submit its calculations regarding an appropriate conservation target.
“We are still in a drought, but we are no longer in the-worst-snow-pack-in-500-years drought”, said Felicia Marcus, the head of the state water board. She says: “We don’t want to cry wolf”.
In a rare move, board member Tam Doduc, a licensed civil engineer, abstained from the vote, saying the lack of specific conservation targets was inappropriate for an emergency regulation.
“I wash my veggies and I save the water”, she said, explaining that she uses it on her plants. “This is an emergency”.
That’s good news to Southern California landscaper Greg Gritters, who says local water officials are best suited to manage their supplies. The board will still press urban water users to continue conserving, but with a softer approach. “We wanted to make sure people didn’t keep pouring water on their lawns with wild abandon”.
Her supplier, the Irvine Ranch Water District, led the push for a regional approach.
The proposal being considered would allow districts to determine how much water their residential and business customers must save in light of local supply and demand.
The change was praised by local water districts.
Though El Niño failed to deliver the levels of regular winter rainfall that meteorologists had expected, it did produce above average amounts of rain and snow in the north of the state for the first time in five years.
Southern California, however, remains deep in drought, and it’s unclear what the future will bring.
Bans on wasting water by washing sidewalks with a hose or cars without a shut-off nozzle would become permanent under the proposed regulation.
“California’s water challenges are vast and extend far beyond the current drought”, a letter from the California Coastkeeper Alliance, Natural Resources Defense Council, and Pacific Institute said, according to BuzzFeed.
Environmentalists have urged state regulators not to let up on conservation, citing forecasts that indicate the possibility of a dry winter ahead. Those new measures include requiring local water districts to submit monthly reports on water use, conservation and enforcement.
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But California’s decision Wednesday to return conservation goals to local control has them hoping their bills will get a little more manageable, and their yards a little less ugly.
