HomeMy WebLinkAboutItem 7.1 StatusRptDroughtRestrictions (2) CITY OF DUBLIN
AGENDA STATEMENT
City Council Meeting Date: April 22, 1991
SUBJECT: Status Report on Drought Restrictions
(Report by Public Works Director Lee Thompson)
EXHIBITS ATTACHED: None.
RECOMMENDATION: 1) Submit a letter to the DSRSD Board recommending
that street sweeping equipment not be required to
use recycled water due to the poor cost/benefit
ratio and if construction grading work is required
to utilize recycled water, that the requirement be
lifted following the drought.
2) Advise the DSRSD Board that the Dublin City
Council has been and continues to be interested in
exploring the use of recycled water at the Dublin
Sports Grounds (DSG) .
3) Direct Staff to enter into negotiations with DSRSD
Staff to develop an agreement for the City' s use
of recycled water to irrigate DSG, providing that
(a) the water be clean enough to meet health
standards for body contact and (b) a method of
financing the Capital and operational expense be
determined through a water rate surcharge, the
sale of water to the City, outside grants and/or
District facilities charges so that the cost of
water to the City would be approximately the same
as or less than the cost of potable water.
4) Request DSRSD to define a 25% voluntary cutback
for the City of Dublin as a customer.
FINANCIAL STATEMENT: None as a result of this report. There are several
possible future financial impacts outlined in the
Description portion of this report.
DESCRIPTION: This report is an update regarding drought-related
items that have taken place since the City Council meeting of April 9th.
On April 16th, the Dublin San Ramon Services District (DSRSD) Board of
Directors met and discussed several items relating to its declaration of the
drought emergency.
1) Water Use Reduction Ordinance: The State has not as yet announced
the final water allotment to the Zone 7 Water District pending the State's
snow pack survey. However, it appears that there will be 6,000 acre feet of
water available from the Del Valle reservoir and at least an additional 10% of
normal year allotment to Zone 7 based on the March precipitation. DSRSD may
therefore be able to continue with the 25% voluntary water cutbacks and not
move on to the higher mandatory phases of the water rationing program. The
Board still seemed to be in favor of constructing a well in Pleasanton to aid
the future supply of water. The 25% cutback has not formally been defined by
DSRSD; however, from talking to the DSRSD Staff, it is presumed to be a 35%
irrigation water cutback for Dublin from last year's peak water use season.
2) Public discussion at the meeting indicated that the speakers have
substantial investments in landscaping and do not look favorably on having
water allotments reduced to help keep the City parks alive. Board Member
C-,J /0(2 -80
ITEM NO. Ind COPIES TO: DSRSD Board of Directors
Zone 7
Covello explained that if more work had been done to research the City's
actual water usage in parks prior to the District's public hearing, the
recommended allotments presented at that hearing would have been different
inasmuch as the allotments hit the parks more severely than anticipated, and
that the parks were affected to a greater extent than residential landscapes.
3) The public hearing for the revision of the DSRSD Code regarding the
unauthorized use or waste of water was continued until May 7th in order to
obtain additional information and to request input from local builders and
builder groups. One of the topics was the permanent requirement to use
recycled water for construction grading operations. This requirement appears
to be extremely costly if retained permanently rather than only during the
drought. In addition, the sewer plant does not have the ability to load
trucks with recycled water if the demand becomes very high.
Also included in the draft document is the requirement that recycled
water be used for sewer flushing (by DSRSD) and street cleaning. The street
sweeping requirement would affect Dublin, as Dublin's contractor, A-1
Sweeping, would have to drive to the plant approximately four times per day
while sweeping. This could cost the City of Dublin approximately $10,000 per
year extra for street sweeping while saving only the estimated equivalent of
one household's water use. DSRSD will need to check with the County Health
Department to see if these uses of secondary treated water are allowable.
4) DSRSD Staff presented a draft study for using recycled water at the
Dublin Sports Grounds (DSG) . The most feasible option appears to be purchase
of a skid-mounted package filter unit which would be located at the sewer
treatment plant. The filtered water would be stored at the plant and then
pumped directly through a temporary or permanent pipe to DSG. The cost of
this option, assuming a permanent delivery pipe, is approximately $380,000.
Several amortization scenarios were listed to determine the selling price of
water in order to break even. A 10-year amortization would require the water
to be sold at $3.27 per 100 cubic feet as compared to the present $1.26 per
100 cubic feet for potable water. At the $3.27 rate, the cost per year for
irrigation water at DSG would increase from approximately $30,000 to $78,000
and would amount to a large City of Dublin-subsidized recycling experiment.
It should be noted that DSRSD's recent water rate increase to
$1.26/100 c.f. puts the District's water consumption rates above the other
Valley water retailers. Not including meter charges, the rates for the other
retailers are: CalWater - 69.5 to 98 /100 c.f. (mixes Zone 7 water with well
water) ; Livermore - 64.5 to 95.4 /100 c.f.; and Pleasanton - 56 to 66 /100
c.f. (mixes Zone 7 water with well water) .
Water re-use is a good idea from an environmental standpoint, and
other funding should be pursued to make this recycling project work. There
are some State bills pending which would help if passed; however, given the
State's deficit, the outlook for passage of these bills is not very good. An
alternative that the DSRSD Board discussed is to levy a one dollar per month
recycling charge to its customers. This fee would raise in excess of $90,000
per year and could be used toward this project.
It would appear that the amount of time that it would take to get
the recycled water project on line would preclude its use for this peak water
season. Staff recoiiiruends that the use of recycled water at DSG be pursued for
future years if an economical method of financing can be implemented.
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