About this time of the year, since I have been on the City Council, I usually write an article about my concerns for fiscal responsibility and the desire for a balanced budget without the use of our reserves. I still have that belief and desire to see a balanced budget achieved. I am, however, not going to write an article about the budget this time. I am going to write about water. Seems like an uninteresting topic, doesn’t it?
Take some time to think about water, where does our domestic water come from? How does it get here? What if there was an interruption in the supply? What would be the ramification of an interruption for say, 60 days? Have you given any thought to how you and your family and friends would deal with this problem?
Oh sure, there are other regional problems like transportation, traffic, environmental concerns, housing costs and a myriad of other issues. I would, however, hypothesize that without our water these other problems would pale in importance.
We in Foster City are solely dependent on water from the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission and its Hetch Hetchy Water and Power Division. Our water comes from the snow pack in the Sierra Nevada near Yosemite. It is delivered, 168 miles, through a collection of pipes and dams and tunnels which cross through serious earthquake faults as well as the lower San Francisco Bay.
Let me be quick to say that Foster City has excellent emergency plans to address mitigation response, repair and recovery from a local water emergency. As part of the San Mateo County Office of Emergency Service we are prepared to respond with emergency water plans.
The Hetch Hetchy water system provides water to about 2.4 million people. 1.7 million of those people live outside of San Francisco and have very little to say about the system. This is a system that went 70 years without any major overhaul or serious maintenance.
In 2002 the Bay Area Water Supply and Conservation Agency was established by the State Legislature at the request of representatives of those 1.7 million people. The purpose of the agency, among other functions, is to monitor the water system improvement program which addresses the 70 years of lack of attention. The total 4.3 billion dollar project should be completed by 2015. I try to be optimistic about the budget and timing. I am Foster City’s representative on the Agency Board of Directors.
I guess the reason for my ramblings on this issue is because I think more people should be concerned with looking at more reliable and un-interruptible sources of water such as desalination.
I have convinced our City Council to make this issue a policy priority. I have also been successful in getting some conversation started on the BAWSCA Board. I understand the cost ramifications and environmental issues which would need to be addressed. The next time you pay $3.99 for a gallon of gas, think about what you would be willing to pay for a gallon of water if you had been without a convenient source of water for 30 to 60 days.
Rick Wykoff can be reached via e-mail rwykoff@fostercity.org
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