- Membership would allow town to draw water from SR Aqueduct and
pay lower rates
by COREY YOUNG, Staff Writer
Windsor officials are negotiating a deal to become a
full-fledged member of the Sonoma County Water Agency, allowing the
town to buy water at the same rates as other communities in the
county.
The water would be sold to customers south of the town limits,
near the Sonoma County-Charles M. Schulz Airport, and would be
drawn from the water agency’s Santa Rosa aqueduct. The deal has
been in the works for several years.
Membership as a “prime contractor” in the agency is advantageous
for the town because Windsor could pay lower rates to buy water and
would have access to the SCWA’s water conservation resources and
programs, said Assistant Town Manager Matt Mullan.
In addition, the town could share its water conservation efforts
with the agency’s other partners, which include the cities of Santa
Rosa, Rohnert Park, Cotati and Petaluma.
“We would basically raise the bar for the agency by bringing the
(water conservation) programs, and they recognize that,” Mullan
told the Windsor Town Council last week. “The commitment to water
conservation is an important one to the overall integrity of the
system.”
As a prime contractor, Windsor would realize an immediate
savings in its water costs, as it would no longer pay 120 percent
of the highest aqueduct charges as it does now, said Mullan. The
town would have the same standing as other communities in the
agency and would be an “active participant” in developing future
water policies that affect Marin and Sonoma counties.
In order to join the agency, the town must meet four conditions,
said Mullan. Those include a regulation on how much water can be
drawn (650 acre-feet per fiscal year) and an agreement that the
town’s water conservation efforts meet the same level of water
savings as other agency members.
Mullan’s report to the council said those conservation standards
should be easy to meet because the town has shown strong support
for water conservation funding and projects in the past.
The town will also pay a fee to the agency to connect to the
aqueduct. The amount currently under discussion is $2.3 million,
but Mullan said the town would like to lower that figure in future
negotiations with the agency.
The town would continue to pump water from its own Russian River
wells for the majority of its needs inside the town limits, but
have the SCWA as a backup source.
As a member of the water agency, the town would also be at an
advantage in formalizing its permanent river water rights with the
state, a process that has been on hold for more than a decade.
