ANAHEIM : City May Lower Water-Saving Goal
Because of the recent heavy rains, the city may lower the goal of its voluntary program to reduce water usage from 15% to 10%, city Utility Department officials said last week.
Darrell L. Ament, the department’s assistant general manager, told the City Council that last month’s rains pushed local rainfall to 131% of normal and that the snowpack on Northern California mountains, where much of the city’s imported water originates, is 68% of normal.
At this time last year, the city’s rainfall was only 24% of normal and the snowpack was 14% of normal, he said. The state has had below-average rainfall every year since 1984.
Ament said the conservation goal would be lowered if the Metropolitan Water District, which supplies 31% of the city’s water, eases its restrictions on the city. The rest of the city’s water comes from local wells.
Ament said the city has met the 15% goal in five of the last 10 months, and the department projects that by the end of the current fiscal year, the city’s water usage will have decreased to 2.11 billion gallons from 2.31 billion gallons used in fiscal 1990.
According to department figures, 57% of the city’s water is used by residents, 40% by business, 2.5% by the city and 0.5% by farmers.
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