As Ed Schroeder pointed out in his Enterprise letter on May 11, we are going to have to pay more in the future for our water no matter what projects ultimately are required to meet our needs. We Davis old-timers who established our way of landscaping in the pre-metering days of a flat $14 per month were encouraged by that rate structure to believe our water supply was without limit and our God-given right. Even God can’t give us unlimited groundwater.

The beauty of the existing adopted water rate structure (CBFR) is that it simultaneously provides an opportunity for all of us to educate ourselves about our water supply by isolating the shared public costs from those costs over which we have individual control and challenges all of us to consciously decide how much water we use.

Yes, the decision to use less water is difficult for those of us who remember the “good ol’ days” or who love traditional lush garden landscaping. However, higher costs for increasingly scarce water supplies are a fact of life. The CBFR doesn’t change the decisions we will have to make, but it does provide more transparency and clarity.

Measure P, on the other hand, is unfair to residents living in apartments, mobile homes and single-family homes who have native plant landscaping, all of whom make the lowest demand on the water system. Measure P will not prevent rates from going up. Measure P only guarantees that any new, alternative rate structure will be less transparent and thus sow the seeds of increased mistrust of government when future increases are needed and truly justified. Measure P is bad policy.

The existing adopted CBFR is a bold and innovative plan to more fairly and transparently apportion costs for a basic public service. The existing adopted CBFR structure presents an opportunity for all of us to reconsider how we use a limited and precious resource. Please vote NO on Measure P.

Dave Hart
Davis

Comments

comments