WaterSanDiego
SAN DIEGANS SPEAK OUT
"We're increasingly the city that embraces ideas to secure our water future.… Here in San Diego, we're taking matters into our own hands."
Mayor Kevin Faulconer speaking at the International Desalination Association World Congress in San Diego, 2015
"It's a travesty that this [water restriction] is going on. This is all political propaganda . . . It's another right they're taking away from us. Slowly but surely they're taking our rights away. Our rights are being shattered." B. G., Oceanside
"California is either in a current drought or going to be in a drought since before everybody reading this was born. That's why intelligent people long before us built the California aqueduct system.
"Ford, Dodge brothers and other dreamers put Americans into autos with not much infrastructure to support them (most roads were dirt, no signals, etc).
"There was no infrastructure for electricity when Edison improved the light bulb (no delivery system such as wires, no transformers, no generators), but we managed to create the new system and we did it 100 years ago with a lot less technology than we have now.
"We landed on the moon 46 years ago. I have a computer in my pocket that has significantly more power than Apollo spacecraft. But we can't improve our water system--I'm not buying it!
"I'm just not quite willing to let 30 years of blood sweat and tears and financial investment [in my property] go down the drain because our elected officials won't address this problem."
Alan S., Poway
Why not let us tap into the purple pipes for irrigation?
San Diego Union Tribune, 7/17/15
" 'I have an easy, workable plan to potentially reduce water use by 40%,' says Dave Ferguson . . . Let him and other homeowners . . . run a line from nearby purple pipes to water his outdoor property."
http://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/news/2015/jul/16/tapping-purple-pipes/
Comments to a local water agency:
1. Riverside is correct that the governor's action, and the rules implementing his action, are not legal, and that it is in the best interests of our ratepayers to file suit on the basis that there is no water supply emergency in San Diego County.
2. Water boards have a duty to determine if an action is itself legal, when there is doubt as to its legality. The courts are the proper forum for determining if the governor's action is legal.
3. The governor's order is causing substantial harm to the ratepayers, in terms of needlessly high water rates (to compensate for mandated volumetric cuts), property damage, out of pocket expenses (e.g., costs that ratepayers incur to comply), etc., and to local businesses.
4. The governor's order produces no new water supply, and penalizes water districts that have made investments to reduce water demand.
5. There is no shortage in San Diego today, and no case has been made that there will be a shortage here next year or in future years. Indeed, not only is the stated position of the San Diego County Water Authority that there is no shortage today, and the position of the US Bureau of Reclamation that there is no shortage this year or next, but supply conditions are improving materially today, even without water allocations and penalties.
6. County reservoirs are rising and will continue to rise as the Carlsbad desal plant comes online in about 90 days; historic rains in the six states that feed the Colorado have raised storage in Lake Powell more than 15% in recent months, contracted additional Colorado supplies equal to two more desal plants are coming beginning in 2018 (and our share of the Colorado is protected even in the event of any future allocations); potable reuse investments (aka Pure Water) are being fast-tracked and will produce more local supply than the desal plant; and climatologists have declared that the current El Nino is one of the most powerful on record and almost certain to persist into 2016.
7. The best, most effective, and most responsible course of action for San Diego is to continue to do what it has been doing, without demonstrably harmful interference from the Governor. Our program has proven its effectiveness to date and, if permitted to continue without the needless and material burden of the "Jerry Brown Tax," will position San Diego for supply security for the foreseeable future.
Don Billings, Solana Beach
Comments to water agencies:
I want to thank you for all that you, and the other member agencies of the San Diego County Water Authority, have done to diversify our water sources to make sure that here in San Diego we have no shortage of water supply, even in the 4th year of a drought. It took independence and vision to build the largest desal plant in the Americas, and be one of the pioneers in reclaiming water.
Today I am here to ask you to continue with that independence and vision to lead California—and the nation—in developing and implementing solutions to our water problem. Not shower buckets, unflushed toilets, dirty cars and yards of dirt and rocks, but technology. There’s as much water in this world today as there has ever been. It's just not in the right places!
This is the kind of problem that bright scientists, engineers and entrepreneurs dream of—how to get a massive supply of a needed commodity to the massive market that needs it. Reservoirs, pipelines, desal and reclaimed water are just the beginning—who knows what some motivated young scientists and engineers could come up with, if they had the freedom and options to do so?
The governor has essentially spit in your faces in dismissing the work you’ve done over the past 20 + years to plan and implement cutting edge technology. And how did you respond? Like a dictator, the governor told us to jump, and you said “Yes sir, how high!?” Instead of holding San Diego up as an example for the rest of the state, you shouted “Every drop counts!” on your website, on roadside signs, and in community meetings, and are leading us down a miserable path of increasing deprivation.
And what has it gotten you? No amount of deprivation will be enough for this governor and his advisors. They're in our bathrooms, he’s gone after farmers' livelihoods, landscape and nursery businesses, our beautiful trees, flowers and lawns, swimming pools are on the list. Farmers are forced to let fields of trees die, and other fields go fallow. The governor and his advisors are enforcing the greying of our homes, and the destruction of the agriculture and water industries in California. They're doing that by trampling on the legislative process, sweeping aside requirements for public comments and review, forcing through decreased water sales, increased fees and permanently increased restrictions. They're dismissing your knowledge and expertise, and rushing to prevent you from doing your job of providing water for your customers.
So today I’m here to ask you to hold San Diego up as an example for the rest of the state—the rest of the world! I’m asking you to let your ratepayers know the facts—that thanks to technology, San Diego does not have a shortage of supply, that the governor is fast tracking, not new sources of water, but new regulations to reduce our quality of life and hogtie the advances that will provide more water every year.
I’m asking you to continue with vision and courage to develop real solutions, and stand up for what is right.
Tell the governor NO! "
Catherine Dickerson, Solana Beach