LV Valley Water District approves drought plan

Wednesday, Feb. 5, 2003 | 11:21 a.m.

The largest distributor of water in Nevada approved a plan to conserve water in response to a three-year drought that has cut supplies of resources throughout the West.

The Clark County Commission, acting as the board of the Las Vegas Valley Water District, unanimously passed the drought plan Tuesday. The water district serves 800,000 customers in Las Vegas.

The Southern Nevada Water Authority, the wholesale water provider to local agencies throughout the county, passed the plan last month. But because the agency failed to provide copies of the plan to the public before the vote, the authority will have to repeat the process.

The water authority provides water to six area distributors, including the water district. The distributors also have to pass the plan because most water-use regulations are enforced by the local agencies.

The plan includes three stages with different levels of use restrictions and waste penalties: a drought watch, which could begin within months; a drought alert, which could begin in January; and a drought emergency, which could begin, if the drought continues, in January 2005.

The plan is a response to a drought that has sent Lake Mead water levels plummeting, reduced the flow of the Colorado River to a fraction of its normal yield, killed lawns in Colorado and threatened agriculture in California.

Local users also were hit when the federal Bureau of Reclamation cut water allotments to Nevada and California because of the collapse of efforts in California to make long-term arrangements for reducing the use of Colorado River water.

Nevada lost about 30,000 acre-feet per year in the cuts, enough for about 150,000 people. But Pat Mulroy, general manager of both the water authority and the water district, said the cuts were likely anyway because of the declining amounts available from the river.

She said it was critically important to get the water district to endorse the drought plan.

"As the largest of the water agencies, we have to go first," she said of the water district. "We will be able to help the smaller agencies immensely by taking the lead. ... We have a leadership responsibility."

If the drought continues, the seven states that share water from the Colorado River will have to work out a new cooperative arrangement, Mulroy said. Having a working plan in place to conserve water will be crucial to the credibility of Nevada in those negotiations, she added.

Provisions in the plan would allow watering once a week in the winter, every other day in the spring and fall, and any day during the hot summer months from May through August. Misting systems to cool outdoor patios on commercial properties would be banned except in June, July and August.

The plan also would restrict man-made lakes, new landscaping, fountains, and the use of water for irrigating golf courses.

The plan would give water users only one warning if water is running into the street before mandatory penalties are imposed.

The Las Vegas Valley Water District is the largest of five distributors that deliver water to homes and businesses in Clark County. The plan also must receive approval from the other districts, including the cities of Henderson, North Las Vegas and Boulder City.