Citing rain and local conservation efforts, Foothill Municipal Water District loosens watering rules
A pipe slowly gurgles water that a Tom Saywer Camp camper uses to rinse mud off her hands during MUD time in La Canada Flintridge on Tuesday, August 5, 2014.
Foothill Municipal Water District customers can be slightly more forgiving about their water use, after officials announced last week conservation measures would be rolled back to “extraordinary,” due to sufficient stores of northern rain and snow collected in recent months.
FMWD General Manager Nina Jazmadarian said the combination of successful conservation efforts by residents and healthy precipitation levels in Northern California have allowed regional water suppliers to ease up on resident restrictions.
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“Conservation from the public has been overwhelming — we’re down to 1950s levels, as far as demand goes,” Jazmadarian said in an interview. “We’re really still below normal in the Southland, but in Northern California El Niño had heavy impacts.”
Extraordinary conservation, signified by the color yellow, means residents will be allowed to water their lawns up to three days a week in summer months, as opposed to the twice weekly maximum that’s been in place since FMWD switched to an orange “allocation” status last July.
The news follows Gov. Jerry Brown’s May 9 announcement that intense restrictions of 25% or more, doled out in April 2015, would loosen up in favor a more consistent, long-term water conservation plan.
“Californians stepped up during this drought and saved more water than ever before,” Brown said in a statement after issuing his new executive order. “But now we know that drought is becoming a regular occurrence and water conservation must be a part of our everyday life.”
What that will mean for water customers in La Cañada Flintridge and La Crescenta remains to be seen, but Jazmadarian said new conservation levels will likely be based on the gap between suppliers’ past demand levels and estimated future supplies.
On Monday, FMWD held a public hearing to allow local residents to comment on its newly updated 2015 Urban Water Management Plan (UWMP), a document that details current and future water supplies and demand levels.
The 147-page report presents the district’s long-term planning strategies and assesses the reliability of FMWD’s water source over a 20-year period. It can be found online at fmwd.com, under “Current News.”
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Sara Cardine, sara.cardine@latimes.com
Twitter: @SaraCardine
