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Thursday, August 23, 2007

Wondering how this is going to work

I have made it pretty clear, in a number of posts on my blog, that I approve of water conservation. I was thrilled that the city where I live, which isn't exactly known for common sense, would instigate year round water restrictions. People can still water their lawns but until today, only on alternate days. Rather than making this a short term policy during the summer after water is limited, the policy was put in place for the whole year which I heartily agree with. The new wrinkle is that starting today, due to the severity of the drought, people are only allowed to water their lawns once a week. They still have me. I agree. No problem. Maybe this will help shift more people towards conservation minded landscaping. Save the water for food crops when it's in such short supply. What startled me, and set me wondering how it would work, is one of the penalties.After two fines, the city will cut the offenders water off. Surely I am missing something. Will the water ever get cut back on? Does this mean if you miss the notices plastered all over the place you have to move to another city because your town won't give you any more water. Don't get me wrong. I have very little sympathy for people ignoring the warnings and fines. I don't even water my lawn once a week, then again I've replaced my lawn with a wild garden which is coping pretty well. I've collected rain water when we have had the periodic showers. The showers haven't put a dent in the drought but have helped on a small scale, and the collected water has stretched it out a bit further in my garden. I still can't help wondering what will happen to people who have their water cut off. Since the worse offenders so far have been people on large estates with automatic irrigation systems, perhaps they'll move to a wetter climate.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Well, I agree. That is a tough one...I guess these folks could dig a well? One of our neighbors is digging an irrigation pond that will hold 10,000 gallons of water. I haven't figured out where he's gonna get the water. Another did have a well dug to water his 15 zones of water sprinkled lawn... The well was a bazillion feet deep and would only provide for one zone.
One has too much time on his hands and the other too much money.
We are about to melt here in AL for sure. The weathercasters are calling this a 'once in a century event.' I sure hope so.
I guess the offenders who can afford the fines can also afford to re-plant their lawns. I hope we don't have to do that. Plus side is that there isn't much reason to mow!
It was 100 degrees here at 8:30 last night. Once in a centruy is quite enough.
Love, K.

If you can't take the heat, don't tickle the dragon.
-anonymous

Carver said...

Wow Kim,

You're in a worse situation than we are, although we have broken records all month. We are having a big cool down this week with highs only into the 90s and lows in the 70s. Our close to two weeks of 100 degree day temps with 80s at night have finally broken. If it gets any cooler, my local newspaper will run out of topics to discuss. Today the big weather story was that if we want to estimate what our August electricity bill will be we should add 11 percent to what we paid last August, OUCH. Love, C