California Drought and Orange County: The Elephant in the Room and She’s Dying of Thirst (OCRegister)

Jan.19, 2009 in Drought, Public Works, Water Conservation, Water Crisis, Water Industry, Water Management, Water Rates

(Jan. 15, 2009, The OC Register)

California has a drinking problem: It’s running low on water.

At a meeting today of south Orange County mayors, Rancho Santa Margarita Mayor Gary Thompson told attendees that despite the budget problems in Sacramento, the drought has to be a priority for local officials and residents.

“I think a lot of people are really losing sight of the real elephant in the room, and that’s water,” Thompson said at the meeting in the Dove Canyon Country Club.

“If we don’t have any water, we’re not going anywhere,” he said.

After a brief presentation by Thompson, Joan Anderson Dym, executive director for the Southern California Water Committee, painted a grim picture of the state’s water situation.

“Rationing, I think, is, unfortunately, going to be in the future,” Dym said. In an interview, Dym said parts of Southern California could have water rationing as early as this spring.

Dym added that she hoped that state legislative representatives would form some type of caucus on water issues.

While the majority of the Southern California water comes from the Colorado river and the Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta, Dym said that the supply has dropped.

“Unfortunately, Mother Nature has not been kind to either one of those sources,” Dym said.

More than 90 percent of California is in some stage of drought, with most of Southern California in a moderate to severe drought range, according to information released today by U.S. Drought Monitor, part of the National Drought Mitigation Center.

Dym and Thompson urged attendees to work with their water districts to coordinate their efforts and promote water conservation.

Other attendees at the event included representatives for State Assemblyman Jeff Miller, Rep. Gary Miller (R-Diamond Bar) and State Sen. Mimi Walters, as well as Irvine Mayor Sukhee Kang and Orange County Supervisor Pat Bates.

Bates said she hopes there won’t be any water rationing, but thinks the possibility of rationing might get residents to change their water-use habits.