Metropolitan Water District declares regional drought emergency

LOS ANGELES - The Metropolitan Water District of Southern California declared a regional drought emergency Tuesday amid most of the state being hit with extreme drought conditions. 

The resolution, which was adopted by the directors of Southern California's regional water wholesaler MWD, calls on local water suppliers to implement all conservation measures possible to reduce usage. The MWD manages water deliveries to 26 agencies in six counties, serving 19 million people, including the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power.

"We need immediate action to preserve and stretch our limited State Water Project supplies," Gloria D. Gray, chair of the MWD Board of Directors, said in a statement. "Southern California on average gets about one-third of its water from Northern California via the state project. Next year, we'll be lucky to get a small fraction of that."

A majority of California remains under the "extreme drought" or "exceptional drought" designations by the U.S. Drought Monitor. 

The declaration by the MWD board follows a proclamation last month by Gov. Gavin Newsom of a statewide drought emergency. Newsom had previously issued the declaration for other parts of the state, but the Oct. 19 extension of the order added counties that had originally been excluded: Los Angeles, Orange, Riverside, San Diego, San Bernardino, Ventura, Imperial and San Francisco.

In July, Newsom called on residents statewide to cut their water use by 15% below 2020's levels to help alleviate the drought conditions and save 850,000 acre-feet of water -- enough to supply more than 1.7 million households for a year. He urged residents to limit outdoor watering, use recycled water when possible outdoors, take shorter showers and only run dishwashers and washing machines when they are full.

However, state figures the next month showed residents had only reduced use by about 5%.

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FILE - An aerial view shows Echo Lake and downtown in Los Angeles, California on May 4, 2020. (Photo by David McNew/Getty Images)

MWD officials on Tuesday noted that in August, Lake Oroville -- the primary reservoir on the State Water Project -- had reached its lowest-ever level.

The LADWP receives an average of 41% of its water supply annually from MWD through the State Water Project. 

"The drought that we are currently facing is serious," Anselmo Collins, assistant general manager of the DWP's Water System, said in a statement. "We urge everyone to take a closer look at how they are using water inside and outside their home because the water we save now is water in our reservoirs for next spring and summer when demand typically goes up. We are also closely monitoring supply conditions and may call for additional measures to step up conservation, should that become necessary."

For the past 12 years, the DWP has been in Phase 2 of the city's Water Conservation Ordinance, limiting outdoor watering with sprinklers to three days a week. According to the agency, people with odd-numbered street addresses are limited to watering on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays, while people with even-numbered addresses are limited to Tuesdays, Thursdays and Sundays.

City News Service contributed to this report.