Los Angeles is running out of water, and time. Are leaders willing to act?
“The Los Angeles City Council will meet Thursday night to decide how to address dwindling water supplies. At a press conference Tuesday night, Mayor Eric Garcetti promised the city will take the lead in addressing the problem.”
“But even if the City Council agrees to act — which few expect — it won’t be able to do much as it already depends on a vast network of individual taps scattered around the city to meet its water needs. The vast majority of those taps have been shut down for maintenance, the kind of routine maintenance that is happening more often than it used to.”
“As a result, Los Angeles is on the hook for roughly $1 billion that was left over when the state and federal government paid for the cost of shutoff in the past.”
“The water emergency in Los Angeles is not just about drought, it’s about our water supply not being met in a timely manner from the state and federal governments. It is also about our water infrastructure not being upgraded. It is also about our water bill not being kept up with inflation.”
“Garcetti is still talking about how he planned to take action to secure water for the city’s residents without a massive overhaul of water infrastructure. And his plan didn’t get far.”
“As the mayor noted on Tuesday, the drought has made people in parts of the city like the Westside impatient with the pace of work on the water infrastructure.”
“And that impatience has helped prompt a showdown over water in the City Council. Council members are split over whether to turn to Garcetti and urge him to turn the city’s back on its public water system for private sources.”
“The council has been dealing with the issue since the last session of the City of Los Angeles Council ended in July, in part because the last council had its own water emergency with some members complaining about the slow pace of