Water Prices Likely to Rise

Regional water officials are warning Orange County customers to expect up to a 14% increase in water bills this year because of pending cutbacks in the amount of water that can be pumped from area wells.

The Orange County Water District, the wholesale water supplier for more than 2.2 million people, told municipal water agencies last month that they might be asked to reduce the amount of ground water they use by 10% starting in April.

The restrictions are necessary to help replenish the local aquifer, which has shrunk because of high demand and four years of below-average rainfall, district officials said.

As a result of the cutbacks, local water agencies will be forced to rely more on higher-priced water from Northern California and the Colorado River.

The additional cost could increase a homeowner’s water bill between $18 and $36 per year.

“The drought had a significant impact, and we need time to recover,” said Ron Wildermuth, spokesman for the county water district. “If a city has to raise rates, we want [customers] to know it’s because of the drought, not because of inefficiencies.”

The local aquifer provides 75% of the drinking water for northern and central Orange County.

In April, the water district board will decide the exact cutback to impose in ground-water usage.

The reduction will depend largely on the amount of rainfall this winter, and might be tempered if surplus water becomes available from the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California -- the agency that provides drinking water to 17 million people from Ventura County to the Mexican border.

Regardless, county residents should expect future water bills to steadily increase because of the dwindling regional water supply, Wildermuth said.

The federal government recently halved coastal Southern California’s water allocation from the Colorado River. Officials at the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California said they have a strategy to offset the reduction for the next two decades.

Alternative water supplies might be secured from Northern California and produced at a few proposed desalination plants.