Candidate for
Board Member; Municipal Water District of Orange County; Division 5

Wayne Clark is serving a second term as President of the recently consolidated Municipal Water District of Orange County (MWDOC). Clark led the effort to combine MWDOC with the former Coastal Municipal Water District to provide more efficient service to most of Orange County. He has served more than 20 years as a leader in the municipal water industry, now representing Division 5 of MWDOC, including the cities of Irvine, Lake Forest, Laguna Woods and Newport Beach.

Under Clark's leadership, MWDOC is taking action to ensure water service reliability and quality in anticipation of future population and industrial growth in one of the nation's most dynamic counties. His latest effort is to initiate studies toward construction of seawater desalination facilities along Orange County's coast to ensure a new alternative source of high quality desalted and purified seawater for domestic use. These facilities would have their own electric generators to provide backup power in case of system failures and would be environmentally sensitive to the coastline and surroundings.

"Because of the rapid population and industrial growth in Orange County, we must act to provide for the additional demand locally. We can no longer expect to import new water from the northern Sierra Nevada snow pack or from the drought-struck Colorado River. Now we must use all of our resources, including more effective water management, conservation, repurification of wastewater for landscape use, as well as seawater. We must also stop allowing storm water and urban runoff to pollute our streams and ocean shore. The water industry must become leaders in protecting our natural and urban environment," Clark said.

Clark has a long history of public service in Orange County. After leaving law school, he became a newspaper reporter and columnist for major newspapers, and then served a decade as public relations assistant to the chancellor at UC Irvine. He served as a deputy to an Orange County Supervisor, formed his own public relations firm serving major corporate clients, and after retiring in 1993 formed and became the Executive Director of the Urban Water Institute, a nonprofit corporation which has grown to include some 200 water agencies, cities, counties and related consulting firms as members. Its purpose is to inform water industry leaders on resource management and economic issues.

As a resident of Irvine, he helped form the Irvine Unified School District, served as chairman of the city's first planning commission, became the first publicly elected director and president of the Irvine Ranch Water District. He helped initiate Irvine's ability to draw less expensive groundwater from a well field built in Santa Ana, helped to expand the region's first use of reclaimed wastewater, establish the San Joaquin marsh for University research and environmental improvement and brought the first major water transmission facility to South Orange County.

A native of California, Clark served in the U.S. Army in the occupation of Japan, received his BA Degree in Economics from the University of California, Berkeley, and became one of the early residents of Irvine, where he and his wife, Margaret raised two children and continue to reside.