THE CALIFORNIA DROUGHT : Uneven Responses Raise Fairness Issue : Diplomacy: Michael Gage, chief of the DWP commission, takes his call for a statewide water policy to San Francisco. His audience reacts with skepticism.

In a first, tentative step, the president of the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power board on Tuesday brought his pitch for a statewide water policy to the capital of anti-Southern California sentiment.

Water and Power Commission President Michael Gage told an audience of Commonwealth Club members several times that if the Berlin Wall can come down, Northern and Southern California can discuss water issues.

“We were skeptical of (Soviet President Mikhail S.) Gorbachev when he brought about perestroika, “ Gage said after the speech, which was received coolly by some members of the audience. “First forays are frequently met with skepticism. We’re going to have to work at it. This is not going to be easy.”

Gage came to San Francisco seeking support for the development of a policy that would bring about increased water supplies. While he did not have a specific plan in hand, Gage said such a policy would rely heavily on conservation, it might also include “new plumbing” to more efficiently move water from Northern to Southern California.

Gage sounded environmentalist themes before the crowd of about 100 business and community leaders. He emphasized his Napa County roots, his years as a Northern California assemblyman, and his membership in such environmentalist groups as Friends of the River.

He acknowledged the perception that “Angelenos are the pre-eminent water-wasters of the world,” and he admitted there were “elements of truth” in the movie “Chinatown,” about Los Angeles’ notorious water grabs.

“That was then, this is now,” he said.

Gage enumerated the strong environmentalist credentials of the DWP commission’s new majority. He said rationing is being imposed on Southern Californians and he explained how water conservation is being encouraged.

But try as he might, he did not win over many in the crowd.

“What is being done about all those private swimming pools in Southern California?” one man demanded.

Replying that pools use roughly the same amount of water as a plot of grass of a similar size, Gage coolly responded: “If you folks want to know who the water culprits of the West are, it is your lawns and our lawns.”

“People in San Francisco are not watering their lawns with fresh water,” a woman in the audience retorted. “We haven’t watered our lawns for the last five or six months.”

“I wasn’t meaning that in any way personally,” Gage said.

Gage was conciliatory for the most part. But he also noted that nearly all of the Bay Area’s water is piped in from the Sierra. The East Bay gets its supply from the Mokelumne River. San Francisco and much of the Peninsula drinks water from Hetch Hetchy Reservoir, which is in Yosemite National Park.

Fending off the inevitable question about Los Angeles’ past drawing down of Mono Lake in Owens Valley, Gage drew a few very hesitant and nervous laughs by saying: “I’m no more proud of Mono Lake than you probably are of Hetch Hetchy.”

Gage’s appearance at the Commonwealth Club luncheon marked the first time in anyone’s memory that Los Angeles’ top water official had delivered a speech in San Francisco.

The Department of Water and Power had asked the Commonwealth Club to give Gage the chance to speak, given the heightened awareness of water supply problems brought about by the five-year drought.

Gage said there was no need for more dams in Northern California, and he called for environmental protection to be written into the state Constitution for San Francisco Bay and the Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta, which is vital to the health of the bay and is a conduit for much of Southern California’s water.

The Delta is the most important freshwater estuary not just in California, Gage said, but on the West Coast of both North and South America.

He said several times that there was no need for a Peripheral Canal to divert water to Southern California from the Delta.

Gage called for a statewide water policy that also would include more efficient use of existing water supplies, legislation to allow agricultural water districts to sell part of their allotted water to cities, and removal of some farmland from production.

Whether Gage’s appearance made a difference is not known. But he pointed to the dramatic changes in Eastern Europe and how the United States and Soviet Union were “semi-allies” in the Persian Gulf War.

“If those things can change,” Gage said, “even the North and South can talk together.”