California cities have set a record for water cuts. In May, the reductions amounted to 29 percent, according to data released this week by the State Water Resources Board.
Regulators hope the savings will last through the summer as cities statewide have been ordered to cut water use by 25 percent or more compared to 2013 levels.
“It’s an encouraging sign that more communities are stepping up, and we want to see this much more through the summer months,” said Felicia Marcus, chairwoman of the water resources board. “It ends up putting off the need for much harsher rationing, which has greater impacts on people and the economy.”
The water savings in May are reportedly the best showing since the state began tracking conservation last summer. The report from the water resources board followed several months of tepid conservation: 13.5 percent in April and 4 percent in March. The data is self-reported by more than 400 California water departments and includes residential and business consumption. All regions of the state showed signs of improvement.
Sacramento and its surrounding communities conserved the most water in cutting usage by nearly 40 percent. Los Angeles and San Diego counties hosts more than half of the state’s population and these regions conserved 25 percent of water allocations in May.
The water regulations board has assigned communities a mandatory conservation target between 4 and 36 percent, depending on how much water residents used last summer, that will be tracked between June and February. Cities that don’t meet these targets face fines or state-imposed restrictions on water use.
“The numbers are encouraging, but they also tell us that we must keep it up,” Marcus said. “We don’t know when it will rain and snow again, and if the drought continues beyond this year, we’ll be glad we took these measures.”
Mark Gold of UCLA’s Institute of the Environment and Sustainability, said that although a “mild May” may have helped with conservation, saving 29 percent demonstrates that Californians have made a “tremendous … behavioral response.”
“Now we’re going to see how willing the public is to sacrifice their outdoor gardens for conservation purposes,” Gold said. “I’d be surprised if the decline will be as successful for June as it was in May. We need to roll six months (of conservation) together to make a significant difference.”
