Elections

By Joe Krovoza

On Tuesday, March 5, all ballots are due to the Yolo County elections office for a “yea” or “nay” on Measure I – a binding vote on whether or not Davis should proceed with a joint regional surface water supply project with Woodland. What’s the plan? Draw new surface water from the Sacramento River north of I-5’s overcrossing, treat it, and use it as our primary source of water.

The driver for the project is a groundwater basin that is degrading, primarily in its quality. This is problematic since both cities rely entirely on groundwater. The degradation is now serious enough that Woodland has been fined for wastewater discharge violation. Davis must anticipate the same.

by Michael Harrington

Dear Readers of the Davis Vanguard:

Even at this late date, with ballots that must be received by Elections Dept not later than 8 pm next Tuesday, March 5^th, there are large numbers of undecided voters.   Ballots can be dropped at the Library on 14^th St as late as Monday, and hand-delivered to a regular polling place at the Vets Memorial Center on Tuesday, until 8 pm.

By Lois Wolk

The Davis City Council and the Water Advisory Committee adopted a rate structure that complies with Proposition 218. The tiered rates for the next two years reflect the most common rate structure adopted by urban water agencies across the state. They are consistent with California law and practices in communities throughout the state that encourage conservation.

In 2008, the governor signed my bill (AB 2882) to allow a water rate system that encourages water conservation – “allocation-based” rates, also known as “water budget” rates. These rates allocate a reasonable amount of water to each property for indoor and outdoor use. If a homeowner uses more than his budget, he pays more to pay for all the extra costs to deliver most water. The Irvine Ranch Water District has used this type of rate for more than 20 years and has seen customer use decline to some of the lowest in the state.

Last week, the Vanguard showed that criticism of the city on the water rates for Rancho Yolo was misplaced.  By having it set up as a multi-family unit and thus at the MFR rate, the residents have saved a lot of money over individually metering their units.

Nevertheless, and for reasons that are not clear, Bob Dunning, the Davis Enterprise columnist, continues to press the attack on this issue.  He used a portion of his Tuesday column to criticize the council, arguing that their “lack of answers” were “startling.”

by Robb Davis

I remember the first time I really started thinking about water.  Despite growing up in the riparian beauty of the Pennsylvania piedmont where water ubiquitously ran through open fields, I had never really thought about it as a source of life.  A trip into the edge of the western Sahara-over the stricken landscape of Mauritania-changed that.  It came on the tail end of a decade-long drought in in the mid-1980s and was occasioned by a proposed health intervention that required us to assess the nutritional status of children in villages along a band of dying oases out on the fringes of the sand and rock. This trip made me really think about water for the first time.

Local guides led us through shifting dunes to arrive in exhausted ancient salt-trade-route towns to weigh kids whose lives were draining away in the sand. I say “draining away” literally because many suffered from dehydration brought on by chronic diarrhea and misguided feeding practices that indicated that food and drink should be withheld from children suffering from diarrhea.

By Alan Pryor

Public television viewers may have caught last week’s two-hour show about hexavalent chromium (chromium-6) in California drinking water. In part, the show discussed the continued efforts of the California Department of Public Health (CDPH) to impose a Maximum Contaminant Limit (MCL) on chromium-6 in drinking water throughout California…

Chromium is a naturally occurring metal in soils and natural waters. It exists in a variety of forms with chromium-6 being the most toxic to humans and wildlife. In addition to being a proven human carcinogen, when ingested chromium-6 exhibits a variety of toxic effects on animals including extensive damage to the gastrointestinal tract, liver, and kidneys.

One of the critical issues in the Measure I debate over whether the city needs to go from groundwater to surface water is the long-term viability of the current groundwater system.

Critics of Measure I have argued that the city can move to the deep well aquifer and away from the medium depth wells that are producing high amounts of minerals in their discharge.

By Alan Pryor

Super sleuth Bob Dunning is at it again. His latest reporting uncovered the nefarious scheme by the City to unfairly give some Davis residents well water for a small part of a summer day.

Bob implies it was his own that uncovered this hidden conspiracy that denies giving every single resident in the City 100% surface water for every drop that comes from their faucets during the summer months.

by Nancy and Don Price

Ken Wagstaff, former Davis Mayor, claimed in his March 17 Op-Ed that opponents to Measure I are guilty of myth-making when we say that the “Davis/Woodland municipal system will be ‘privatized’ because it will hire an operator.”

Unfortunately, it would seem that Wagstaff and supporters of Measure I, including a clutch of elected officials, are either responsible for creating their own myths or don’t fully understand what privatization means.

by Eileen M. Samitz

Like so many Davis citizens, I was torn between the pro and con arguments between the “Yes” and “No” campaigns.  What really helped me decide how to vote was seeing the televised debate between the two sides sponsored by the Vanguard of Davis and continuing to read the articles, letters, and Op-Ed pieces before and after that debate.

Opponents of Measure I claim:  1) “there is nothing wrong with our water quality”, and 2) “there is no urgency to address our water issues”, however I cannot agree with either of these presumptions.  As the deadline draws near for mail-in votes to be received by March 5^th, here are some of the many reasons to vote “Yes” on Measure I.

By Jerry Hallee

Two weeks ago, we received the city’s mailer that explains the proposed water rate increases. The mailer gives a sample single-family resident rate applied to a typical household.

Davis’ Rancho Yolo senior community is assessed at the multi-family residence rate, which rates are not mentioned in the city’s mailer.

By Matt Williams

Twice in the past month I have been faced with a “laws vs. ethics” conundrum. The first came as part of a development application review process conducted by Yolo County’s South Davis General Plan Citizens Advisory Committee (the “committee”)  regarding a proposal for eleven homes on the south side of Montgomery Boulevard (just south of Willowbank) under the provisions of the Yolo County Ag Cluster Housing Ordinance.

The second came yesterday as part of an ongoing discussion of how to assess the fairness of the Supply Charge in the CBFR rate structure.

By Michael Bartolic

I’ve had opportunity to see the grassroots outreach of the folks at the No on Measure I booth at the Farmers Market – their bake-sale alternative to the proponents’ pricey paid ads – and it’s raised my spirit immensely to experience first-hand how a groundswell of informed public opinion is rising against Measure I, a bad project pumped up by big money.

It’s clear many that Davis residents really get what the central issue of this campaign is: Do we needlessly and precipitately surrender our water system to a cabal of privatization advocates and real-estate speculators, gifting them guaranteed profits at no risk while saddling ourselves under crushing debt for a system larger than needed and beyond what most can afford; or do we plan wisely, acting with fiscal restraint to build modestly and incrementally for only what we truly need, and thereby keep Davis affordable for all?

by Matt Williams

In yesterday’s thread keithvb made the following post,

“It is obvious to me that we need a complicated, difficult to understand system of paying for our water. That way we will all be hoodwinked together.”

The Consumption Based Fixed Rate system has been attacked mercilessly in the last few weeks, by voters who are uncertain as to what it means and how it is derived, and by columnists who have concocted, at times, wild scenarios to show how on the margins it might be unfair.

Last week Bob Dunning used it to show how much more people will be paying for summer water than they will for winter water.