Conservation offsets will be critical to UCSC water case
J.M. Brown
Santa Cruz Sentinel
12/04/2012
Ahead of a hearing on a proposed city water expansion for UC Santa Cruz, opponents of a desalination project designed to boost regional supply will host a forum Monday on the water-neutral philosophy it wants the city to pursue.
Santa Cruz already charges development fees that offset some increases in water demand, but Desal Alternatives has urged a formal policy requiring offsets through conservation. The grass-roots group is pushing a raft of alternatives to a facility that would turn seawater into drinking water to shield against drought.
"The whole idea of water neutrality is to prevent the water situation from getting worse," said co-founder Rick Longinotti.
Water demand offsets are critical to the university case to be heard Wednesday. The city has argued that it has enough water in most years to meet current and projected demand, but will run short during severely dry periods.
The Local Agency Formation Commission, which will weigh requests by the city and university to extend service for growth in an undeveloped part of campus, passed a policy earlier this year requiring applications for boundary changes and other projects within the agency's jurisdiction to be water neutral. In response, the city agreed to place fees paid by UCSC for water expansion into a special trust for conservation.
While the city was willing to establish such a policy for the UCSC extension, a growth agreement that enables more on-campus housing,
Mayor Ryan Coonerty said development charges are sufficient to offset other demand as it arises.
"What a policy implicitly relies on in is that there is going to be more development," Coonerty said.
Featured at Monday's forum will be Ron Duncan, conservation manager for Soquel Creek Water District, the city's desalination partner; John Ricker, the county's water resources director; and Randele Kanouse, a former official for the East Bay Municipal Utilities District, which created an offset policy after a wave of development in the 1990s.
Desal Alternatives points to Soquel Creek Water District's water-neutral policy, created in 2003 amid an overtaxed groundwater basin, as a reason Santa Cruz should pursue one.
