Santa Barbara Declares Drought Over, Lifts Restrictions

City Council members Tuesday declared an end to the drought in a city that a year ago hired a special police squad to cruise through town, enforcing bans on washing cars, hosing down driveways and watering lawns.

With its reservoirs swollen by the winter’s abundant rainfall and a desalination plant ready to begin test operations today, the council voted unanimously to lift the last remaining restrictions on water use for its 85,000 residents.

“We declare the drought over,” said Mayor Pro Tem Hal Conklin. “We are prepared to go back to almost full water use, even if it doesn’t rain for five years.”

Santa Barbara is the first sizable California city to make such a declaration at the close of six years of below-normal rainfall across the state, said Dean Thompson of the state Department of Water Resources’ Drought Center in Sacramento. He suspects others to follow, but not cities that import water from the Sierra Nevada, such as Los Angeles.

The city resolution comes a day after a National Weather Service meteorologist declared the drought over in Ventura and southern Santa Barbara counties. The area, soaked with as much as 130% of normal rainfall so far this year, is bracing for another storm later this week.

The Santa Barbara-owned Gibraltar Reservoir is spilling over and the area’s main source of water at Lake Cachuma is nearing 80% of capacity.

City officials said the two reservoirs hold enough water to meet the needs of Santa Barbara and adjacent cities for the next three years without any additional rainfall or tapping of ground water.

In addition, the city recently completed a $30-million desalination plant that will feed its first batch of desalted seawater into the city’s main water lines during tests today.

Once it reaches full operation, the desalination plant could produce enough water to meet the needs of the city residents at current levels of use, although the desalinated water is about eight times more costly than water from the reservoirs.

The unusually wet winter and relaxed water restrictions have transformed Santa Barbara into the lush paradise it was before emergency water measures made the city’s brown lawns and wilted landscapes a symbol of the state’s seemingly endless drought.

Despite the gradual relaxing of the rules, Santa Barbara residents continue to use 30% less water than before the drought, said Sandra E. Lizarraga, deputy city administrator.

Much of the conservation comes from the city’s ongoing program to encourage drought-resistant landscaping and low-water-use bathroom fixtures.

MORE RAIN: Another storm is headed toward the Southland, forecasters say. B3