Water agencies outline steps to cutback for drought
From tossing turf on golf courses to using low flowing toilets, the county and local water agencies are collaborating to find the best ways to save water.
The Riverside County Board of Supervisors hosted a “Water Conservation Workshop” where water agencies and county departments went over ways to deal with the four-year drought.
Riverside County wants to lead by example; cutting back on water use for the more than 700 buildings it uses. One of the most water efficient is the Indio Law Center.
“You are going to have a hard time finding a blade of grass out there, it’s all zero-scape all the urinals and toilets are extremely low flow for example the urinals use one eighth of a gallon per flush which is extremely low for water use,” said Robert Field, assistant county executive officer for the Economic Development Agency.
“What I’m hearing from the agencies is pretty well uniform,” said board Chairman Marion Ashley. “They’re doing about everything they can possibly do and are now being asked to do much more. Whether it’s a small effort or a huge effort — we need all those efforts.”
The Coachella Valley Water District and Desert Water Agency remain at odds with the state over water use by seasonal residents.
The districts want the state to take snowbirds into account instead of just running off numbers from the 2010 census. If the state reclassifies our area with a higher population, we could go from being forced to save 36 percent to 28 percent.
Regardless of our population, water districts say they will fight for every drop, that means cracking down on golf courses.
“All new golf courses are limited to 90 acres, where they have 4 or 5 acres per hole and they have 10 acres for the driving range so all new golf courses will be very water efficient and now the goal is to assist the existing golf courses to reduce their turf grass so everybody meets the same standard,” said Donald Ackley, water management supervisor for CVWD.
Firefighters will need to be more tactical when it comes to sucking up water to battle wild fires.
“We are going to take water when we have to take water for fire fighting, we are going to be respectful of ponds that don’t have any recovery, and we are going to be watching the continuing impact of insects killing trees in the riverside county mountains,” said John Hawkins, Riverside County Fire Chief.
The board concluded the workshop with a unanimous vote directing the Executive Office to provide quarterly reports on agencies’ “water conservation” efforts; to examine the possibility of a “hotline” for county residents to report “drought regulation violations;” and examine the feasibility of a rebate program intended to help residents purchase smart irrigation systems.
