San Diego Mayor Opposes Mandatory Water Limits

The city manager recommended Wednesday that San Diego join the growing ranks of Southern California cities that have responded to the drought by adopting mandatory water conservation rules. But Mayor Maureen O’Connor promptly announced that she favors voluntary water conservation.

San Diego is one of just five cities and water districts in the county that have not declared the Stage 2 water alerts that limit when citizens can water lawns, wash cars and fill swimming pools.

Earlier this year, the San Diego County Water Authority, which supplies all but a trickle of the water consumed in the county, urged its member agencies, including the city of San Diego, to declare water alerts because the drought has reduced the amount of imported water by about 10%.

Carlsbad and Poway on Tuesday night became the latest water distribution agencies in the county to adopt mandatory water conservation.

“Most of our (24) member agencies have already set a date for implementation of Stage 2 alerts,” county Water Authority spokesman Bill Jacoby said Wednesday. “Only five, including the city of San Diego, have not.”

San Diego council members Wednesday received copies of a city manager’s report that endorses the Stage 2 mandatory conservation alert. The council will debate the need for water conservation during Monday’s council session.

The Stage 2 alert proposed by the city manager would limit lawn watering, car washing and filling swimming pools to the hours from 6 p.m. to 9 a.m. Residents with addresses ending in odd numbers would be allowed to use water on Mondays, Wednesdays and Saturdays. Even-numbered addresses would be allowed to use water on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Sundays.

In addition to O’Connor’s outright opposition to mandatory controls, the city manager’s report generated disagreement among council members on how mandatory conservation should be implemented.

San Diego Councilman Ron Roberts said mandatory conservation should be in place by June 1. Roberts, who on Monday will introduce a plan that includes most of the recommendations included in a city manager’s report, said he was “embarrassed that we don’t have it in place already. . . . We should have done this last summer.”

Councilwoman Linda Bernhardt believes that “the city manager’s report is going in the right direction,” said Jay Powell, Bernhardt’s environmental adviser. But Bernhardt also is concerned that Roberts might be “jumping the gun” by trying to adopt a mandatory program without proper planning and citizen education, Powell said.

Bernhardt wants council members to construct a “positive” program in which residential customers understand that they have a variety of options to reduce water use, Powell said.

Other council members also voiced support for a mandatory conservation program. Councilwoman Abbe Wolfsheimer is “supportive of the second phase,” an aide said. “She thinks you have to be realistic, the reservoirs are getting lower and we need to conserve.”

But O’Connor believes that it’s too soon to set mandatory conservation in place, according to a draft of a memorandum that O’Connor plans to circulate to council members today.

In the memorandum, O’Connor argues that a mandatory conservation program is not needed this summer because San Diegans, who in the past have willingly met “civic challenges . . . will react with equal civic-mindedness to the present water dilemma.”

O’Connor’s memo states that during water shortages in 1957 and 1977, San Diegans voluntarily reduced water use by 20% and 15%, respectively. Similar savings could be generated through an “intensive education-information program,” the memo says.

The mayor hopes to win support for a voluntary conservation plan that will reduce use by 10% among government, industry and residential water users. The memo states that San Diego State University, UC San Diego, Caltrans, the University of San Diego, Sea World and other large water users have agreed to the mayor’s request that they cut water use by 10% during the next three months.

O’Connor is also opposed to mandatory conservation because the program would worsen the city’s woeful economic outlook for the fiscal year that begins July 1, according to the memo. “Voluntary compliance will not only save water but save the city $4.8 million from a proposed mandatory water conservation budget,” the memo states.

Roberts argued Wednesday that the mandatory conservation plan that he will introduce Monday would not significantly increase the city’s budget woes, in part because state and federal funds are available.

The mayor’s opposition to mandatory conservation puts her directly at odds with the County Water Authority, which distributes water in San Diego County, and the Los Angeles-based Metropolitan Water District, which imports most of the water consumed in Southern California. Both of those agencies have asked their member agencies to enact Stage 2 water alerts.

City staff members, in a report issued Wednesday, noted that “concern has been expressed by the MWD, CWA, CWA member agencies, press and public regarding San Diego’s position on this issue . . . it is critical that the City of San Diego actively participate in cooperative water conservation measures.”

But O’Connor’s memo suggests that, “thanks to some long-range vision on the part of local officials, San Diego’s water problem is not so severe” as the situation faced by some other Southern California cities. “We have an adequate supply of water, but must face the reality that it is prudent to shift into a voluntary conservation program before a real emergency occurs.”

In a report issued Wednesday, Deputy City Manager H. R. Frauenfelder recommended that the City Council adopt the Stage 2 alert and implement five of 12 programs included in an April 26 report to the council. Those programs are designed to further reduce water use in San Diego.

Those five programs are:

Installation of ultra-low flush toilets at city facilities.

Investigation of water-waste complaints.

The addition of a full-time water-waste investigation team.

Development of a water consumption data base for the city of San Diego.

Adoption of a new water rate structure that would tend to discourage use by raising the incremental price of water.

The city manager also recommended that several other programs be studied by a committee that will include representatives of the county Water Authority, San Diegans Inc., the San Diego Board of Realtors, the Apartment Owners Assn., the American Society of Plumbing Engineers, the Sierra Club and the Metro Sewer Task Force.