Cities prepare for voluntary water conservation

<p>There should be enough water flowing in Sonoma County to meet summer demand with the same voluntary conservation measures that have been in place the past two years, officials said Monday.</p><p>The Sonoma County Water Agency warned, however, that in keeping with the water crisis hitting the rest of California, state water regulators may require even deeper cuts that would push the North Bay into mandatory conservation.</p><p>“They are looking for us to share the pain of saving of the resources this year,” said Pam Jeane, the Water Agency’s deputy director of operations. “We are in a third dry year statewide.”</p><p>The Water Agency on Monday told its customers, which are the cities and water districts from Windsor to San Rafael, that it could supply 54,591 acre-feet of water this year, compared to a normal amount of 58,500 acre-feet.</p><p>During the warm summer months, when use goes up, it plans to provide 5,400 acre-feet a month, compared to last year, when some summer months reached 6,300 acre-feet.</p><p>The quantity is restricted by the amount of water that the district can release from Lake Sonoma into Dry Creek without damaging the fish habitat and by the critically low level of Lake Mendocino.</p><p>The agency’s customers are the cities of Windsor, Santa Rosa, Rohnert Park, Cotati, Sonoma and Petaluma and the Valley of the Moon, North Marin and Marin Municipal water districts.</p><p>For the past two years, those customers, representing 600,000 residents, have had voluntary conservation measures in place that resulted in a 19 percent water savings, beyond the 15 percent that was asked.</p><p>“I’m hopeful that we will be able to do this with voluntary conservation,” said Jake Mackenzie, a Rohnert Park councilman and chairman of the Water Agency’s Water Advisory Committee.</p><p>The committee and the Water Agency’s Technical Advisory Committee, both of which represent the customers, approved the water allocation budget on Monday.</p><p>This week, the Water Agency will file a petition with the state Water Resources Control Board asking to be able to lower the requirements for flows in the Russian River near Healdsburg to conserve water in Lake Mendocino.</p><p>The requirements are set to meet the competing demands of water use, recreation and fish health, but could drain Lake Mendocino, which is about 60 percent full, by the end of the summer.</p><p>Jeane said she expects the state, when it acts on the petition, to at that time also ask for deeper conservation measures.</p><p>Instead of being able to deliver 5,400 acre-feet a month, the state could require a delivery of only 5,000 acre-feet, or even lower, touching off mandatory conservation measures.</p><p>“If the word comes down that we have to save even more, we will have to grapple with that,” said Santa Rosa Mayor Susan Gorin said.</p>