A politician forecasts tighter water restrictions will leave the utility’s budget high and dry. The Greater Vernon Advisory Committee has initiated stage one water restrictions in the hope of decreasing consumption during the hot weather. “I agree with conservation but we will lose revenue for the utility,” said director Bob Spiers, adding that a 10 per cent reduction in residential consumption could reduce revenue by $158,000 in Vernon in the third quarter. Staff insists stage one restrictions are needed because of the ongoing dry conditions. “We are doing heightened awareness and targeting water waste,” said Zee Marcolin, utility manager. “We want people to know what they should be doing. There’s a lot of watering of roadways.” Marcolin added that larger agricultural customers are also being contacted about conservation. “We want to hit this hard so we can stay away from stage two.” Director Doug Dirk suggests that the funding of utility operations may need to be reviewed. “User fees are sensitive to usage and changes in usage and taxation is not,” he said.
Under stage one, residents can water:
• Tuesday, Thursday, and/or Saturday if their property has an odd address number.
• Wednesday, Friday, and/or Sunday if their property has an even address number
• Automatic timer irrigation may operate between the hours from midnight to 6 a.m.
• Manual sprinklers (moved by hand) may be used between the hours of 6 and 10 a.m. and 7 p.m. and midnight.
• Drip irrigation may operate between the hours of 7 p.m. and 10 a.m. (could previously run anytime under normal restrictions)
• Customers using a watering can or hose with spring-loaded nozzle may hand water anytime
More details can be found at www.rdno.ca/waterrestrictions.
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Don Quixote Note:
The need for stage 1 restrictions was announced because of the reservoir levels that service the Duteau Creek customers.
Quote from http://www.rdno.ca/index.php/news/media-releases/stage-one-water-restrictions-in-effect-for-greater-vernon-water-customers
“Our reservoirs filled early this year and then stopped spilling on June 10, 2015. This means we are using stored water earlier than normal. Combine that with a hot, dry June causing everyone to irrigate more has pushed us into Stage 1 restrictions”
At the meeting I informed the Committee:
To impose the stage 1 water restrictions on all residential customers regardless of water source (and maybe some commercial customers who water their property ) but not agricultural customers seems to me to be counter productive as to results . The stated intent is to lessen our domestic demand by 10% and thus will reduce our Water Revenue by $158,434 in Vernon Residential 3rd quarter water use IF a 10% reduction actually does occur. (Not calculated was the commercial outside irrigation nor the residential or commercial customers in Areas B & C and Coldstream who are serviced by the Mission Hill Plant which has a Kalamalka Water source where there is no current shortage )
BUT the water shortage that can be reduced by the Duteau Creek domestic customers is only about 20% at most of the domestic customers. (80%) of these customers draw their water from Mission hill plant ( Kal lake - where there is no water shortage . Foregoing this revenue will not add a drop of water to the Duteau Creek reservoir situation.
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I was pointing this out as the unexpected consequence of going to stage 1 conditions for all domestic customers regardless of their source of water (Duteau vs Kal Lake-Mission Hill )
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