By Hector Gonzalez
Special to The Lookout

July 31, 2015 -- Santa Monica got good news this week on two fronts in its ongoing fight to save water when new state figures revealed residents beat a state-mandated conservation goal for June, and municipal facilities like parks and buildings recorded cutting water use by more than half last month.

While Santa Monica's 92,185 residential water customers worked to cut back by 22 percent last month, compared to the same period last year, the City itself collectively reduced its usage by 52 percent from June 2014, largely by ripping out grass where it could and watering less where it absolutely needed to water.

Grassy medians were left to dry altogether, said Kim O'Cain, an environmental analyst in the City's Office of Sustainability and the Environment.

City Facilities Maintenance Manager Devin Starns noted the dual savings. “We all love Santa Monica, and just as we are asking residents to save water, the City itself is doing its part to conserve at every opportunity,” said Starns.

Future plans include removing grass around City trees, using mulch to cut down on watering plants and installing high-efficiency faucets and fixtures in the remaining 40 percent of City buildings not already equipped with the devices, O'Cain said.

Residential customers of the City's water utility used about 76 gallons of water per person per day on average in June, compared to June 2013, the base year state officials are using to calculate “conservation standards” for California's largest urban water suppliers. 

Water Resources Control Board officials in May implemented mandatory “conservation standards” – based on water used in 2013 – for all 411 large urban suppliers regulated by the agency, which is working to achieve a 25 percent statewide reduction by February, as required by Gov. Brown's April executive orders.

Although Santa Monica fell below the 25 percent mandate, the overall goal is averaged out among all the suppliers. Santa Monica's reduction goal, or conservation standard, is 20 percent. The City's residential use fell below that 20-percent goal by minus-2 percent in June.

The number is significant as suppliers furthest from reaching their conservation standards will be subject to increasing enforcement actions, culminating in fines of up to $500 a day, said Max Gomberg, the state Water Board's climate and conservation manager.

In the state's June report, officials identified 16 suppliers that are more than 15 percent away from reaching their conservation standards.

 “This is the group we will be focusing on the coming weeks,” Gomberg said in a news conference Thursday, adding that state water regulators will begin meeting with officials from those lagging suppliers as early as next week “to get them back on track.”

“It's not just that we're in a drought—we're in the drought of our lives,” Water Board Chairperson Felicia Marcus said, explaining why state regulators have imposed unprecedented measures and are now poised to get even tougher on non-compliant water suppliers in the fourth year of a historic drought.

Tree-ring and geological evidence testify to sustained episodes of drought in California's past—and also to the fact the state for the past century or so has enjoyed a “relatively wet cycle” that soon could be ending, Marcus told reporters.

 “So that's why we've taken this rather unusual move at a statewide level in the fourth year of the drought when we had to face the possibility that we were in fact entering our own millennial drought that was going to go on and on, and so we have taken the 'better be safe than sorry approach.'”

Following a wet May, residents statewide averaged water savings of more than 27 percent in June, compared to overall water use statewide in June 2013 – a feat Marcus called significant given last month was the hottest June on record, both in the state and worldwide.

“The June numbers tell story of conscious conservation, and that is what we need and what we are wanting,” Marcus said. “But we need to keep it up.”

Translated into numbers, the governor's 25 percent reduction goal amounts to 1.2 million acre-feet in water savings. One acre-foot of water equals 325,900 gallons.

“That's water essentially in the bank for a future dry year or more, which is the point of all this,” Marcus said.