A Pressing need to solve water issues - Editorial in Monterey County Herald

By Bob Brower

Soon after I was elected to the board, I sponsored the idea of a water supply committee to facilitate water supply planning. I have chaired that committee for the past three years with the purpose of solving the Peninsula's longtime water shortage.

First, the major players and their roles:

The Monterey Peninsula Water Management District (MPWMD) is responsible to manage, augment and protect the Peninsula water resources for the benefit of the community and the environment. This includes new water supply and regulation of the water utility on the Peninsula, namely California American Water.

Marina Coast Water District is our neighbor to the north that supplies water to the Marina (and partial Seaside) area, but is a major player in the Regional Water Project.

Monterey County government is involved through the Monterey County Water Resource Agency as the second leg in the regional project and provides resource management for the county.

Finally, California American Water, the third leg in the Regional Water Project, is a publicly owned utility regulated by many state and local agencies. Monterey Peninsula Water Management is not a participant in the project.

The State Water Board has mandated we drastically curtail pumping of the Carmel River. By 2016, our water use will be cut by 50 percent from this source. The draconian effects of this mandated cutback will be felt by business and families. The economic impact to the community is expected tobe $1 billion annually.

The water management district's board of directors is a diverse, elected body with a long history of public outreach to let the community know what actions the district has been working on to solve community water management issues.

We have been hard at work on river mitigation efforts, fish rescues and environment work to improve the knowledge and habitat of our watershed. The hard-working employees of the district can attest to the kudos received from the environmental community.

Soon after I was elected to the board, I sponsored the idea of a water supply committee to facilitate water supply planning. I have chaired that committee for the past three years with the purpose of solving the Peninsula's longtime water shortage.

We have embarked upon a series of water-supply projects that would provide supplemental water to the Peninsula. The first, known as Water Project 1, is an underground storage project (ASR -- Aquifer Storage and Recovery) whereby we pump excess flow of the Carmel River to the Seaside basin, deep into the ground for use during the summer months. In the water year 2009-10 we pumped 1,111 acre-feet for use last summer. This water year, we pumped an additional 1,117 acre-feet for use this summer. We pumped the water at a reasonable cost of less than $1,000 per acre-foot.

Water Project 2 is similar to Water Project 1. It is located at Seaside Middle School and is being built through a joint effort with California American. This will have a slightly higher capacity than Water Project 1. Our district is working on providing a larger supply to these projects, which could result in 5,326 acre-feet of water available from each.

Additional drought-sustainable projects are in development.

Water Project 3 is a small desalination plant at the Naval Postgraduate School. We have just begun the layout and planning with the Navy and could supply 2,000 acre-feet of desalinated water.

Water Project 4 in conjunction with the Monterey Regional Water Pollution Control Agency involves purifying waste water and pumping the results into the ground for future use.

Water Project 5 includes remedial work at Los Padres Dam and would be oriented toward supply and fish passage issues.

The district is committed to delivering water that is sustainable and affordable to Peninsula residents and businesses. While we are not part of the regional project, we are proceeding to move all projects to fruition, which may include new projects or expansion of current storage and supply projects.

While we all have our opinions -- and everyone certainly does when it comes to water -- we need to pull together and solve the water issues now while we still can.

Bob Brower is a Carmel Valley vintner and board chairman for the Monterey Peninsula Water Management District.