Palm Springs sets example in sustainability efforts

Palm Springs city leaders continue to make water conservation a priority, asking themselves these questions at this week’s council meeting:

“What’s the best thing we can do for our community, what’s the best thing to save resources, save money and the right thing for the planet,” said Michelle Mician, manager of the Palm Springs Office of Sustainability.

The office stepped up to the challenge. Its Lawn Buyback Incentive has already dramatically decreased the community’s use of our most precious resource.

“It’s saving about 10 million gallons of water now that all the applicants are in,” Mician said.

And now Palm Springs is doing even more, taking steps that include:

Watering parks and medians every other day Watering in the evening hours Monitoring and replacing broken sprinkler heads Implementing a new radio-controlled irrigation system.

“I’m all for it,” said part-time resident Armen Melikian.

“I think those initiatives are really good, they’re probably something we should be doing every year not just in drought years, we should be thinking about this more often,” said resident Susan Lamb.

You may have also noticed construction in medians like those on Tahquitz Canyon.

“The tribe is doing desert landscaping in the medians as part of their Complete Streets plan. You’ll see pavers going in and those are pervious pavers, also good for water conservation,” Mician said.

City residents say these efforts make Palm Springs that much more appealing as a place to stay.

“It really helps sell Palm Springs because I think a lot of people care about the environment, and it’s really nice to see people are trying to protect it,” Lamb said.

Tomorrow the Desert Water Agency will hold a public workshop to discuss conservation and drought conditions. For information on that workshop visithttp://www.dwa.org/