A couple of stories about water caught my eye in the last week.
If you missed it, go back and check this Washington Post story on the California drought (“Rich Californians balk at limits: ‘We’re not all equal when it comes to water’“).
It seems there’s a sense of outrage among some of California’s wealthier citizens.
The lede:
RANCHO SANTA FE, CALIF. — Drought or no drought, Steve Yuhas resents the idea that it is somehow shameful to be a water hog. If you can pay for it, he argues, you should get your water.
People “should not be forced to live on property with brown lawns, golf on brown courses or apologize for wanting their gardens to be beautiful,” Yuhas fumed recently on social media. “We pay significant property taxes based on where we live,” he added in an interview. “And, no, we’re not all equal when it comes to water.”
And then there have been stories about subsidence in several parts of California, where the ground has been sinking due to the pumping and depletion of underground water reserves.
Check this one from the California Center for Investigative Reporting (“California is sinking, and it’s getting worse“).
According to the story, experts now believe the hardest hit areas of the state could be sinking between one and two feet per year.
This has apparently happened before, between 1925 and 1977.
The sinking, which peaked in the late 1960s, wreaked havoc on the state’s rapidly expanding infrastructure, damaging highways, bridges and irrigation canals. One estimate by the California Water Foundation put the price tag at $1.3 billion for just some of the repairs during that time.
The sinking did not slow until the 1970s, after California had completed its massive canal system – the most expensive public works project in state history.
Here’s a website from the US Geological Survey on the California drought which describes the range of short and long-term impacts.
So what happens if the drought doesn’t end relatively soon?
What’s the impact going to be on property values? Migration? Will people start fleeing California and the rest of the arid southwest seeking places to live where water rationing isn’t the new reality?
It’s a huge challenge for politics and social policy. How do we cope with chronic shortages of essential resources like water?
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Sad that in a state like California, there are people who selfishishly think of water as a commodity rather than a life-preserving resource for all the public. When the shortage gets severe enough, all the money those people possess won’t make their drought-striken estates habitable for human living once the water supply is cut off.
The greed of the wealthy! Shutting off water to golf courses and other unnecessary places should be primary. What is Hawaii’s plan particularly Oahu with its unnecessary building for the wealthy, forsaking agriculture and common citizens needs?
“How do we cope with chronic shortages of essential resources like water?”
Duck soup. First you save water where you can with new toilets and recycled water for golf courses and things like that. But that’s not going be enough so next you raise the price of water and sewer fees to force people to use less, especially the people who no more that much money. Repeat after me, “our water infrastructure is rapidly aging all of a sudden.” After water use drops you start building houses and condos for people from all over the place who have money since it’s okay because no more water shortage anymore. Main thing is no tell nobody how bad the problem really might get in the future or else they might not let you build all those house and you not going go Ka ching! Because after all, that’s what it’s really all about right?
We’ll have plenty of room in Kaka’ako to provide housing for the emigrants from Cali.
yellow journalism —- find a rich guy to make a community look like snobs — Rancho Santa Fe is a great place —that newspaper not so much
@Bill: Yellow journalism? Rob Kuznia is a Pulitzer Prize winner. Wassamatta Bill? Did the article hit a little too close to home for ya?
Folks in Rancho Santa Fe are just going to have to get used to a life with the fountains turned off and indulge in their Jacuzzis less frequently. The horrors, I know!!!