OJAI VALLEY : Casitas District Seeks Views on Water Allocation

The Casitas Municipal Water District is asking the public to help decide how water will be allocated after the moratorium on new hookups is lifted.

“We’re going to put this out at a public hearing to ask the people, the county and the cities how they think we should do this,” board Vice President Laurence Whelan said during a directors meeting Wednesday.

The company serves western Ventura County and the Ojai Valley, and sells water to 14 other companies.

The hearing will be held at 3 p.m. Aug. 22 in the company’s Oak View office.

The directors are considering whether there should be a waiting list, if an applicant should pay a fee to get on the list, who should receive water first, how much water should go to existing customers, new applicants and agriculture, and how much should go to each area in the district.

“We really don’t want to get inundated with people who just want to get on the list,” said John Johnson, district general manager. “And we don’t want someone to be able to buy up all the water and then sell it to someone else.”

The company adopted a one-year ban on new hookups April 11 because it is running short of water from Lake Casitas to meet rising demand. It also asked the 14 water companies that buy Casitas water to adopt the same ban.

Since then, Casitas has been swamped with questions from builders, real estate agents, applicants and customers on how they can get in line for future allocations.

Charles Curtis, general manager of the Ventura River County Water District, said he just laughs at water applicants and refers them to Casitas for answers.