201901.17
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Don’t believe your windshield wipers: Despite storms, Southern California water conservation is still needed

by in News

As rain continues to pelt Southern California, signs of an abundance of or even too much water are everywhere: Roads are flooded, reservoirs are filling and the wait time for Radiator Springs Racers at the damp Disneyland Resort has been less than a half hour.

But as residents of burn areas evacuate and even heavier rain is forecast for Thursday, those who watch the state and local water supplies note that while the drought is technically over, the need to conserve water is not.

“Mother Nature is very fickle, and we have seen California go through multi-year historic droughts, so while we have gotten a couple of good storms to start the year, that’s no guarantee we will continue to see rainfall the rest of the year,” said Chris Orrock, a spokesman for the state Department of Water Resources. “This precious commodity water — it’s not like we can manufacture water — we need to continue to conserve it.”

On the surface, there seems to be plenty of water. The Sierra snowpack, which Orrock calls the “frozen reservoir,” supplies the state with about one-third of its water. The snowpack was measured this month at 90 percent of normal. The other two-thirds comes from 12 reservoirs; seven of them, including Lake Perris in Riverside County and Castaic in Los Angeles County, are filled to at least 98 percent of their historical average.

But below the surface, there’s trouble. In San Bernardino, where residents are allowed to water their lawns only three times per week before 8 a.m. and after 6 p.m., the January rain has not been enough to merit modifying those restrictions.

Miguel Guerrero, general manager of the city of San Bernardino Municipal Water Department, said the groundwater basin from which the city gets its water is at or near historic lows after 10-plus years of drought. Plus, customers are still trying to meet the state goal of using 55 gallons of water or less each per day; the current average use is 60 gallons, he said.

“One storm event is not going to do the trick,” Guerrero. “We need multiple years of good rain. That’s when we can start considering lifting restrictions.”

Some cities, including Anaheim, did lift their restrictions after Gov. Jerry Brown in April 2017 ended the drought emergency throughout the state except for the farming counties of Fresno, Kings, Tulare and Tuolumne. But with the same stroke of the pen, Brown ordered the Water Resources Control Board to prohibit wasteful practices such as watering just before or after rainstorms.

The Anaheim City Council in 2017 passed an ordinance that recommends voluntarily limiting watering to three days per week.

“We still encourage people to stick to those days for the week to save water,” city spokeswoman Lauren Gold said.

But for now, more water is on the way.

A flash flood watch is in effect through 6 p.m. Thursday for Orange, Riverside and San Bernardino counties; and through 1 p.m. Thursday in Los Angeles and eastern Ventura counties. A high-surf warning was in effect as well, from 2 p.m. Thursday to 9 p.m. Friday.

“The last in a series of storms will move through the area tonight and Thursday generating periods of heavy rain that could trigger shallow mud and debris flows in and near recent burn scars,” the National Weather Service said Wednesday.

Evacuation orders were in effect for some of those areas, including a mandatory order for more than 1,000 people to leave in the Laguna A area west of Lake Elsinore. A mudslide enveloped a car on Malibu Canyon Road in LA County just after 6 p.m. Wednesday, causing minor injuries to one person. The rain also triggered scores of traffic collisions Wednesday even as the California Highway Patrol urged motorists to slow down.

SELECTED RAINFALL TOTALS

In inches for 24-hour period ending at 5:48 p.m. Wednesday

City/Total

Downtown LA/0.43

Long Beach/0.98

Santa Ana/1.80

Irvine/1.04

San Bernardino/0.55

Chino/1.00

Riverside/0.63

Corona/1.81