Candidate for
Director; Santa Margarita Water District

Campaign contact: http://www.ocwaterscientist.com and send me an email.

Biographical highlights:

My husband, Hal, our son, Tristan (11) and I have lived in the Santa Margarita Water District since 1989. I was appointed to board in 1994 after all the board members who were involved in causing SMWD's horrendous problems had lost the 1993 election or had resigned. I was elected to our Board in 1996 and now I am seeking my second full term. I have been chair of the District's engineering committee. Previously, from 1981-1989, I had served on the Irvine Ranch Water District Board.

I received my bachelor of science from UC Irvine and then pursued and received a doctoral degree in Environmental Health Science at UC Berkeley. The first woman, I might add, to receive a doctoral degree from the discipline at Berkeley. Environmental health science is concerned with the interaction of human health and the environment and my specialty is drinking water.

I am an internationally recognized expert in the field, having served on many national committees for the National Academy of Sciences/ National Resource Council, the US-EPA, the American Public Health Association, the American Water Works Association, and the International Association of Water Research, Standard Methods for Waters and Wastewaters to name just a few. I have been a keynote speaker for various organizations in a variety of nations, most recently giving an address at the 100th Anniversary of Egypt's Chemical Society on techniques to monitor water quality in the 21st century. I have authored more than 160 papers on various aspects of public health water and land quality. I have received almost 4 million dollars in research funding since the mid 1980s and received a number of awards including the 1982 Woman of the Year for Orange and San Bernardino Counties Women's Business and Professional Association.

Professionally, I am known for thinking about the future and the peoples' health and welfare and speaking my mind when injustices occur. I have trained more than a dozen masters and doctoral students and over 20 postdoctoral fellows as well as visiting professors from other nations. The vast majority of the students have gone into the water business being employed in the private sector and/or at water agencies including Orange County Water District, Metropolitan Water District of Southern California, Irvine Ranch Water District.

I have been a consultant to a number of water agencies including the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California, various water agencies in Orange County, and most recently as a Blue Ribbon Committee Member to Los Angeles Department of Water and Power and the City of Laguna Niguel.

My record on the SMWD Board is based on both the difficulties the (1993-1996) Board had inherited and the successes that are beginning to emerge. When I was appointed to the Board, I learned that the District's operating budget ran in the red. Unbelievable!...and the district has not produced a budget that was in the red since my tenure started on the Board. This success is a group effort of staff, managers and board members. We have developed a team that has lowered our rates from 10 to 16 percent since my appointment to the board.

During the `90s the citizens stood with the district to defeat a hostile takeover by a private company that planned to pay dividends to share holders with any extra revenue. It was an interesting process with the voters saying as we did, `if you have a better deal we will sign on', but they didn't have a better plan. Voters soon realized this as did board members. During my term on the SMWD Board any excess revenue has been put back into your pockets through reducing rates or into your district to protect you during emergencies of low or no water entering the district, stabilize rates over time, develop new sources of supply at cheaper costs and we have kept service high. We have also reduced the budget through decreasing the number of employees (20%), while the number of customers increased (31%).

The board and the district survived the economic recession at a difficult time in the district's development ... one with few homeowners and single large landowners. We knew we had to find a better way to finance the bonds to protect our district during bad economic times. In this we have been successful.

Top Three Priorities:

1) I want to keep reducing rates and property taxes as we move forward. Our rates are high and that's because we are at the end of the pipe (water transportation system) and we were not developed when pieces of the tax pie were given out to other areas. We have not compromised service to reduce your costs and we will continue that pattern.

2) Our district shares a problem with all districts in that we have a growing population and that increases the SMWD's water requirements. Currently we get all of our drinking water from the MWD. They want to hit us with a huge increase in charges because we developed later than places like Los Angeles. I think this is neither right nor fair. The Board has begun, and I will continue, to develop methods to bring us water at rates lower than MWD rates. This is difficult, a politically tricky road in the legislature as well as with other entities within MWD, but currently SMWD is known as the leader of retail water agencies in this field.

3) A number of water quality issues will be facing all water districts across the nation as new water standards come on line. Furthermore, we are faced with identifying new chemicals in our water supplies yearly. I will work both at the local level, the regional level and national level to make sure that our water is safe for our children to drink.

Optional Information

I am not asking for endorsements from the political community because I am not a politician. I am a water scientist. I believe that I must give back to my community and this is the forum I have chosen. My knowledge, experience and insights are indeed unique amongst all of the candidates running. I am dedicated to serve our district and our residents and to provide the best quality water at the lowest cost. Best quality means I will not allow emerging chemicals of public health concern to be overlooked. While I am on the SMWD we will be looking at these before any state or federal regulations exist.