A Handle on Water Supply

There’s been a lot of fuss and considerable litigation lately about whether California’s many massive new subdivisions will have an adequate water supply. Lawsuits claiming that builders did not conduct adequate environmental impact reviews caused the courts to halt several large tracts until developers could demonstrate that there would be water to serve the hundreds or thousands of families that would live in the new houses.

This is an expensive and unreliable way to plan. The Legislature did pass a bill in 2001 that requires the developer of a tract of 500 houses or more to show where the water for lawn sprinkling, toothbrushing and Jacuzzi soaking will come from before local government can approve the project. That’s fine as far as it goes, but these whopping projects are only part of the potential drain in a state where smaller tracts and commercial and industrial developments thirst for what’s left of the water supply.

That gap would be narrowed by Assembly Bill 1015, being carried by Assemblyman John Laird (D-Santa Cruz) on behalf of Atty. Gen. Bill Lockyer. The measure would require cities and counties to include a water supply assessment in their 10-year general plans beginning in mid-2006. Present law requires them to review existing supply reports of local water agencies, but a survey found that the data were pretty much ignored.

Developers and water agencies are complaining that Laird’s measure would stymie development by forcing planners to guess whether there will be enough water years down the road and possibly make them legally liable if there’s not. Laird says that’s not his intent. Indeed, the assessments would be based on water suppliers’ plans and estimates, the availability of known ground-water supplies and the likelihood of new supplies being tapped.

“We need an early-warning system,” Laird says. There’s no point in zoning a portion of a county for commercial, industrial or residential development if there is no water supply, and not likely to be one. The measure also would give landowners and builders the chance to arrange for the water before investing time and money on a project that otherwise might not win approval under the 2001 law.

A hearing and vote on AB 1015 in the Assembly Water, Parks and Wildlife Committee are scheduled today. The committee should speed the bill down the pipeline to the governor’s desk.