Sonoma Valley lifts drought water restrictions

Before the sidewalk had dried from last weekend’s showers, a number of local water agencies – including the Valley of the Moon Water District – started rolling back the water-use restrictions that were put in place last year, opening the floodgates to local control of water restrictions.

At its May 24 meeting, the VOMWD Board of Directors took action to eliminate the Stage 2 water-shortage declaration for its customers. Under those rules, customers were asked to conserve water with limited days and hours for irrigation, no home car washing, pool filling or washing sidewalks, no restaurant water except by request, and similar precautionary measures.

“With our local water supply (Lake Sonoma) in better condition than normal the District has eliminated the water shortage declaration while still encouraging customers to eliminate waste and continue their water efficient practices,” said the district’s General Manager, Dan Muelrath, in a statement.

This action is in response the recent decision by the State Water Resources Control Board’s (SWRCB) to allow supply-and-demand be the basis for determining local water shortage levels. The Water Resources Control Board voted 4 – 0 on May 18 to allow local jurisdictions to set their own water use restrictions, based on local need instead of state mandates.

Gov. Brown called for a statewide water-use reduction of 25 percent just over a year ago, but Northern California has come out of an El Nino year, with increased precipitation and snowpack that essentially re-filled the big dams of Shasta, Folsom and elsewhere – including Lake Sonoma and Lake Mendocino.

“Drought conditions are far from over, but have improved enough that we can step back from our unprecedented top-down target setting,” said state Water Board Chair Felicia Marcus.

At the Sonoma County Water Agency, Principal Program Specialist Brad Sherwood underscored that cautionary note.

“Drought or not, we need to continue using water wisely,” he said. “Our reservoirs are full but we need to impress upon our community that conservation efforts should continue.”

The relaxation in water-use restrictions would technically go into effect June 1, but a number of restrictions will remain in place following that date, according to the Gov. Brown’s executive order of April 9. These include washing sidewalks, driveways or other hardscape off with hoses, washing automobiles without a shut-off valve on the hose, watering lawns within 48 hours of measurable rainfall, over-watering to cause runoff, and using fresh potable (non-recirculated) water in fountains or other water features.

“Those are things that folks just shouldn’t be doing, drought or not,” said Sherwood. “It’s really about being water-smart every time you turn on that faucet.”

City of Sonoma Public Works Director Dan Takasugi told the I-T he would be presenting options for similar relief from drought water-use restrictions to the Sonoma City Council at its next meeting, on June 6, though he did not go into detail about what those options might be.

“VOMWD would like to thank our customers for their extraordinary efforts taken during the last four years of drought to reduce water use and exceed the state mandated conservation targets,” the district’s statement concluded.

The customers of Valley of the Moon responded with over 28 percent in water-use reductions, well above their state-mandated conservation standard of 20 percent, according to Muelrath.

Contact Christian at christian.kallen@sonomanews.com