The governor has asked us to cut water consumption by 15 percent. As a number of experts have pointed out, we are already saving.
Since the “conclusion” of the last drought, most of us have continued to minimize our water usage, meaning there’s not a lot of room for cutbacks.
At the same time, we face a state mandate to produce hundreds of thousands of new dwelling units. At the very least the residents of these new units will bathe and flush toilets, increasing the amount of water used, and yet there was not a word of this in the governor’s announcement.
If there is this wonderful budget surplus, the state should be focused on creating more groundwater replenishment and other recapture programs to ensure an adequate water supply rather than creating more demands on a system that is once again in trouble.
Nancy Gardner / Newport Beach
