Ground Water and Wells in Santa Cruz

I just heard on the radio about a meeting about ground water metering.  This concerns me as a homeowner who is on a well and this regulation will effect me and my neighborhood.  I think this is a controversial issue.  There are many issues with our ground water supply and protecting it.  When I bought my house, the well wasn't deep enough to provide water for a single family home.  Once a new well was drilled, we finally had adequate water supply.  Additionally, there is maintenance: testing if you are drinking the water and filtering out hard minerals, iron, etc. that can stain.

Here's a recap from what I could put together from the mid county ground water website.  Please visit it for more info.

Past Concerns

In the past few years we have been experiencing a drought and that water supply has been questionable.  Many neighbors had to get water delivered once their well ran out of water for the season if their wells weren't deep enough on the water table.  If your neighbor uses a ton of water and it effects your access to water should that be monitored, regulated and therefore should they pay for it?  Living in the mountains, water set up can be kind of funky, like many other things  when living in the mountains. 😉

Regulation

Governor Jerry Brown passed the Sustainable Groundwater Management Act (a three part bill) passed in 2014 whose purpose is to grant local governments to come up with local sustainability plans.  This includes setting limits on water usage and collecting fees for usage.  According to the California Constitution article 10 section 2, our groundwater rights have not changed and will continue to be regulated here.

Future Concerns

The future holds home owners having to register their wells, metering and usage fees.  Coming from a contracting family, I wonder how much harder it will be to build in the mountains and what additional reporting will be required for groundwater basins before permits will be approved.

As all issues, this is not black and white.  I can see that there will be a lot of resident resistance because of the added cost of registering, metering and paying for usage.  And probably many unanswered questions:

• Will there also be water testing and what other cans of worms will that open in regards to minerals? 
• What if hazardous chemicals found in water that people are using and what health effects it could have?
• How much responsibility will the local level of government be taking on and at what cost?  
• Will it require residents to absorb costs to maintain healthy water levels, filtering and to what standards?
• What additional testing will be required to obtain building permits?

And, should the ground water be monitored and protected?  Yes, it is a limited resource.

Threats to Ground Water

According to the Mid County Ground Water website, we have been using more ground water than has been replenished by rain fall, causing a 30 year deficit.  I believe they are eluding to that this deficit has allowed for sea water intrusion which creates an unhealthy water basin.

What YOU Can Do

Stay informed.  Sign up for their newsletter.  Go to the meetings to get more information, and by all means ask questions, and give your opinion to those voting on how to put together this plan, and put in place these regulations.  Since this is done on the local level, the way Santa Cruz approaches this can be completely different than the way neighboring counties will approach this.  What models are they using? I hope the learning curve is small and we can find sustainability without huge costs.

Here is a great FAQ sheet.