City Council to Residents: Get Used to Saving Water

Even though rain seems to be back on the calendar again and news stories are glowing with reports of the state’s snowpack 173 percent of average, Pasadena’s City Council is sticking with the water conservation mantra.

Pasadena is now using water at its lowest rate since 1952, and the Council wants to keep it that way.

“This is the way we will be using water going forward. Conservation is now the new way,” said Councilmember Margaret McAustin Monday evening as the City Council unanimously approved a staff recommendation to maintain the current city water conservation standards for water use, to coincide with a State Water Resources Control Board draft plan for long-term efficient water use in California.

According to the staff recommendation, the State’s Draft Plan provides the framework for implementing Executive Order B-37-16, which calls for “Making Water Conservation a California Way of Life,” and provides guidance for water-providing cities like Pasadena to adopt conservation standards to move towards using water more efficiently on a permanent basis.

The Council acted on a recommendation from a Municipal Services Committee meeting held on January 24.

Although the State’s Draft Plan is evolving, said the report, and will likely change in ways that may mean additional amendments to the Water Waste Ordinance in the future, Pasadena Water and Power also recommended that the City Council “establish permanent irrigation limitations that will persist should the City Council determine that the current water supply emergency no longer exists at some time in the future.”

The City is currently in a Level 2 Water Supply Shortage Plan implementation, which was enacted by the City Council on June 1, 2015. Landscape irrigation is limited to one day per week from November through March and two days per week from April through October.

According to the staff recommendation, staff might return to the City Council to recommend eliminating the water supply shortage declaration or changing the water supply shortage level before April 1, 2017, depending upon how water supply conditions evolve in the current season.

In order to continue to meet conservation goals, and promote more efficient water use on a permanent basis, the staff recommendation would permanently restrict landscape irrigation to three-days-per-week; Add the prohibition of irrigation with potable water of ornamental turf on public street medians.

Also, the newly amended water waste ordinances would clarify that water waste prohibitions apply to any source of groundwater in the City of Pasadena and consolidate the exemptions from irrigation limitations into a single, consistent section, and clarify that the term “residential” refers to both single family residential and Multifamily residential, when determining fines.

The newly amended ordinance would also eliminate the right to a hearing or stay for first violations, not involving monetary penalties.