Overall, the city is continuing to use less water than it did last year when other customers, such as multi-family housing and small businesses, are factored in.
But the inability to affect lasting behavior among homeowners who expend an average 66% of their water on landscaping elicited furrowed brows from some on the commission on Wednesday.
Commissioner Patrick Foley said it appeared residents, despite a year’s worth of conservation messages, were waiting for the bite of mandatory controls to take hold.
He, together with other commissioners, recommended water officials develop more simple, eye-catching ad campaigns “that will maybe hit home a little more.”
Regional and state officials have been beating the drum over a state water shortage crisis that last month prompted a string of dire conservation warnings and drought declarations from Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and water wholesalers.
Brandon Goshi, a water resource manager for the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California, offered the commission little in the way of encouragement “despite 15 years of preparing for exactly what’s happening today.”
Metropolitan, which supplies Glendale with about 70% of its water each year, is drawing down on what had been 2.2 million acre feet of reserves in 2007. This year, those will fall to 1.7 million acre feet, and in 2009, it is projected to fall to 1.1 million acre feet of water as the wholesaler continues to grapple with tightened supplies from northern California and drought conditions at home.
So far, Metropolitan has used a mix of reserves, expensive water transfers, conservation and more groundwater to address the shortfalls.
