The Santa Cruz City Water Department’s service area is 12
square miles. Besides the City of
The agency started in the late 1800s as a private company.
In 1910, it became a city department. A critical event in the district’s history
was the 1976-77 drought, which left the department with a shortage of 38
percent of water supply. This was the worst drought in
The department’s water supply comes from these sources:
·
· Loch Lomond Reservoir (16 percent)
· Live Oak Beltz wells (7 percent)
·
This report investigates how the City of
“City of
Gary Fiske and Associates, Water Resources Planning and Management.
“City of
Toby Goddard, City of Santa Cruz Water Department Water Conservation Office, “Adequacy of Municipal Water Supplies to Support Future Development in the City of Santa Cruz Water Service Area,” March 2004.
1. Santa
Cruz City Water Department has 24,300 connections, serving 90,000 customers. It
is the largest water agency in
2. The department takes 93 percent of its water supply from surface water. The remaining seven percent comes from wells (groundwater).
3. The water department depends on rainfall for 84 percent of its water supply.
4. The water department’s current capacity is 4.3 billion gallons per year under normal weather conditions. Current total water demand is 4 billion gallons per year. This gives the system a cushion of 300 million gallons per year.
5. Average daily demand is 12 million gallons (latest figures from 2000). Broken down seasonally, average summer demand is 15 million gallons per day; average winter demand is eight million gallons per day.
6. Usage is divided as follows:
· Agriculture: 3 percent
· Business: 8 percent
· Single family residential: 77 percent
· Multi-family residential: 11 percent
7. Average
daily residential water use per person is 138 gallons for the State of
8. To
encourage conservation, water rates are divided into five tiers, with rates
increasing as more water is used. The average rate per billing unit (100 cubic
feet, or 748 gallons) is $2.76. Outside
9. The
average monthly residential bill for
10. The drought of 1976-77 left the city 38 percent short of expected water for its customers. A combination of rationing and voluntary conservation was required.
11. Water officials base their water demand projections on expected population growth of one-half percent per year, according to the city’s current General Plan.
12. The following table summarizes projected water demand for the next 25 years. Water conservation has reduced the actual water demand in 2005 to 4 billion gallons.
|
2000 |
2005 |
2010 |
2015 |
2020 |
2025 |
2030 |
|
4,409 |
4,627 |
4,817 |
4,961 |
5,157 |
5,238 |
5,321 |
13. Santa Cruz City Water Department has three options to balance water supply and demand:
·
Water Conservation
The Santa Cruz City Council directed the Santa Cruz Water Department to implement a range of conservation measures. These included both negative and positive incentives. For example, the department uses a five-tier rate structure to encourage lower water use and also offers rebates for the installation of low-flow toilets.
Water savings are expected to increase to about 280 million gallons through the planning period (2005 through 2030), which is about five percent of demand. Annual conservation costs, including staffing, are between $600,000 and $1,000,000.
·
Water Curtailment
The period of water curtailment, or rationing and conservation, typically runs May-October during drought years. Curtailment during a worst-year, peak season is expected to be 45 percent. If no action is taken, however, the city will eventually have difficulty meeting average year demands. By 2015, there will be a 90 percent likelihood of some level of curtailment during normal years.
·
Supply
The department has been searching for new water supplies for the past 20 years. Possible alternatives have included building a dam, developing groundwater sources, limiting new growth and building a reclamation plant. Environmental, economical, technical and political factors have made this difficult.
14. Even with its extensive water conservation programs, the city must develop new supplies as soon as possible. Additional supplies will be needed in the future. Today’s annual demand of 4 billion gallons is expected to increase to 5.3 billion gallons by 2030.[2]
15. The
16. UCSC recently announced plans to add another 6,000 students to its present enrollment of 15,000, for a total that is less than its projection when the university was founded.
17. City water officials say that the system currently has enough capacity to supply the additional water the university will need. However, doing so would absorb most of the water available for other growth.
18. A recent study examined the costs, effectiveness and effects of a wastewater reclamation plant and a desalination plant.[3]
19. The study found that groundwater recharge and wastewater reclamation would be cheaper in the short term and would affect the marine environment less.
20. The study found that a desalination project would cost less long term, would be easier to implement, have a lower impact on the groundwater basin and could have a relatively unlimited capacity.
21. The
California Department of Parks and Recreation opposes the use of reclaimed
wastewater at
22. Presently, the department is trying to get approval to build a desalination plant. A desalination plant converts seawater to fresh water. Depending on the size of the project and the available power, it could provide an effectively unlimited supply of water to the district. The Soquel Creek Water District may join with the department in this project.
23. The desalination project has been proposed by the water department and approved by the Santa Cruz City Water Commission and the Santa Cruz City Council. An environmental impact review has been completed and goes before the City Council in mid-June of this year. A 45-day public comment period will be followed by a decision of the city council. If approved, a pilot program at Long Marine Lab will be approved for one year. If satisfactory, the project will proceed to design, project environmental impact review and, ultimately, application for required permits from local, regional, state and federal agencies.
24. The size of the desalination plant will depend on whether the council approves a project based on normal water use or drought conditions.
25. The city council has indicated it does not favor a drought-based project, because this would provide extra water. They see this as potentially growth inducing.
26. Building the smaller project would mean that customers would face at least a 15 percent water cutback during drought years.
27. The cost of the desalination project will be between $15 and $40 million, depending on whether the project is small or large scale.
28. Water customers would pay an extra $4 to $8 per month to fund a smaller desalination project that would still require a 15 percent water curtailment level during drought years. The cost of a system that would not require water curtailment would be $6 to $12 per month.
29. Recent and projected water rate increases are as follows:
· 25 percent (May 2004)
· 20 percent (January 2005)
· 50 percent (2005-2009)
30. The projected increase would fund capital improvements, as well as allow the department to seek bond approval to fund the desalination plant.
1. Santa Cruz City Water Department customers do an outstanding job of water conservation.
2. Since customers are already conserving water extensively, water cutbacks during drought years will be more of a hardship to customers here than in water districts that conserve less.
3. The Santa Cruz City Water Department appears to be doing a conscientious and thoughtful job of planning for future water needs.
4. Developing new water supplies is critical to the city’s well-being.
5. New
water supplies will require both higher rates and the political will of the
city council and the voters of the City of
1. The Santa Cruz City Water Department should be commended for its work in planning for future water needs.
2. Water officials and the Santa Cruz City Council should begin to build public support for new water supplies and the higher rates needed to fund them.
3.
The City of
4.
When planning for future water supplies, the City of
5. City officials should consider approving a drought-year based water-planning strategy so that citizens do not face unneeded water restrictions during drought years. Citizens should be rewarded for achieving a high level of conservation, not forced to undergo more severe water cutbacks during drought years.
Agency |
Findings |
Recommendations |
Respond Within |
|
|
13, 14, 23, 24, 25 |
1-5 |
60 Days ( |
|
Santa Cruz City Water Department |
1-30 |
1-5 |
90 Days ( |
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