Water Reduction Rebates Are Back!
28 Jun 2016 |
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Native plants are an easy way to landscape beautifully while saving water.
The good news came on June 14 at the Santa Clara Valley Water District meeting. They set a 20% target for water reduction and reinstated rebates.
At the meeting, the SCVWD lowered its water use reduction target from 30% to 20% under 2013 levels. The Board emphasized that residents should continue their efforts to conserve.
On July 1, 2016 the SCVWD will reinstate the Landscape Rebate Program and the Irrigation Equipment Upgrade Rebates. If you’d like to know more, find details here.
We have to ask why take such action? The drought continues although it was eased by last winter’s rainfall. Local reservoirs and percolation ponds are close to full, however, our groundwater levels have not recovered.
In Santa Clara County, our groundwater aquifers are our largest source of water storage. This helps us to get through dry summers and drought. After pulling 100,000 acre-feet of water from our aquifers in 2014 and 2015, we ended 2015 with 232,000 acre-feet. In drought terms, this is Stage 3: Severe. Above 300,000 is normal and before the latest drought we had 340,000-350,000 acre-feet in groundwater aquifers.
So we still urge residents to do what they can to conserve. Like attending local events such as Sherri Osaka‘s talk July 21, 7-8:30PM at the Mountain View Library.
The talk, sponsored by the California Native Plant Society entitled “Design-It-Youself: Native Plant Garden”, has a clear focus: “You are finally ready to remove your lawn in order to save water, lower maintenance time and create habitat. But you want to create the design yourself. Come to this talk, and learn the principles of garden design. See an example of a design from start to finish. Pick up some handouts of different designs you can use and modify. And get ready to put pencil to paper!”
And look to GreenTown for more ideas flowing your way!
