The report in the Mercury News yesterday that mandatory water rationing in Silicon Valley may soon be a reality is not unexpected. The decision of the judge to limit the flow of water through the Sacramento River Delta—which supplies 50 percent of our needs—to protect an endangered smelt is largely due to inadequate rainfall this past year and the crumbling delta infrastructure that desperately needs attention. There is only so much water available even at the best of times, but we are in a drought year and there could be many more to follow. It isn’t unheard of and the situation could get a lot worse.
Most of us use water with reckless abandon under normal circumstances and we really should be more careful. There are many things we can do as individuals to conserve water by making small changes in our everyday habits. This is now necessary. However, 80 percent of the delta water goes to commercial agricultural use, mostly for the high-water requirements of crops such as rice and cotton. Will the industry voluntarily change its habits in light of the situation? Somehow, I doubt it. Will our city council stop approving more large housing developments until such time as the water situation becomes more stable, if ever? I doubt that too.
In the meantime, the board members of the Santa Clara Valley Water District (SCVWD) have been spending the public’s money with equal reckless abandon. You might remember that we discussed some particularly large expenditures by former board member, now highly paid SCVWD employee, Greg Zlotnick, who racked up over $70,000 in travel expenses in one year. According to the article by Scott Herhold in Tuesday’s Mercury News, this is the tip of the iceberg, which is what most of us suspected all along.
Zlotnick, also an attorney, figures large in Herhold’s report. After criticism from the grand jury for his $70,000 in travel expenses claimed in 2003, he scaled back to $30,000 in 2004, plus charging the district $12,900 for attending “meetings” (more about this below). He also claimed his $415 annual dues for membership in the American Bar Association in 2004. (He defends this by stating that membership gives him a discount on some conferences.)
Board members get paid $225 for each “meeting” they attend, up to a maximum of ten per month. It’s not certain what a “meeting” is in this context. I assumed that it was a weekly board meeting, but obviously not. Director Richard Santos believes that attending “meetings” to organize softball games is covered, so he billed the public for $817 to attend four of them, including one actual game. Was he calculating water requirements to keep the infield green? Santos also billed the district $225 to attend “Santa in Alviso,” a children’s charity event, in 2005. Santos wrote a letter to the Mercury published yesterday that defended such practices.
The board member that is giving the shameless Zlotnick a run for our money with his free ride at the public’s expense is Chairman Tony Estremera. He billed the taxpayers $8,100 for attending “meetings” (36 of them I guess) and $18,667 in travel expenses for 15 trips to San Diego over a three-year period. That is an average of $1,244.47 in expenses per trip. I have been trying to figure out how somebody could spend that much money for a couple of days and a night in San Diego. The average round-trip flight on Southwest is around $150 (the fare goes as low as $78 and the absolute highest is $262). I checked and there are plenty of inexpensive and decent accommodations available for less than $150 per night. If you generously allow $200 for two full days of meals, incidental expenses and local transportation, that leaves another $750 extra spent for each trip, or a total of about $11,250. Perhaps there is a leak in Chairman Estremera’s pocket that needs plugging.
Multiply all of this first class expense account spending by ten such “meetings” per month for each director and it adds up to some serious money. All but one member of the board (86-year-old Sig Sanchez) is riding this gravy train to such “meetings,” and it’s shameful and outrageous.
It sounds to me like the public needs to impose mandatory rationing inside the offices of the Santa Clara Valley Water District.
Jack,
My son Paul and I just returned from a fishing expidetion of most Northern Calif Rivers over the Labor Day weekend.
Here at home, the coastal streams in Santa Cruz, San Mateo Palo Alto Santa Clara County, San benito County are all but a trickle, if that.
The damed waters are being depleted.
Feb. 1,2007 You posted”Giant Brush Theatens Water Shed”. San Jose water Company’s logging threat of redwood forest above Lexinton Dam.
This is the appropriate time to repost this informative site. http://www.acfnewsource.org/envionment/fogmasters.html. I would ask that San Jose Water not add to this crisis by removing the very life that redwoods contribute to,ours!
In Northern California, the water availability is near to non existant. Crossing the Benicia Bridge where many rivers feed the Bay, it appears that there is vasts amounts of water to be had, yet as one travels north passed Shasta Dam and it’s low water marks, It become glaringly appearant that life as we know it will cease to exist if Mother Nature does not intervien. Once past Mt Shasta with it’s snow caps hiding in the shadows, we enter the lava valleys. As we head down River on the Mighty Klamath, we see that the flows are minimal at best. The water is very warm and algea colored. We did not experience any releases from the dams above that make up the head waters of the Klamath River. Most of the feeder streams are but a mere trickle.
We decide to return home via the coast route to avoid the horible congestion of construction on highway 5 in the Redding area and above. Once heading south on 101 we crossed the VanDuzen, Eel, Russian, finally Crystal Springs.
The wake up call really came while traveling south along the Eel River . I have never seen this perfect Steelhead and Salmon stream in such a sorry state. Most tailouts were but a mere trickle. I became frightened at the possibility of having to go with out tap water we take so much for granted.
Our Northern Cailornia is going thru the worst of times in all respects. Yet here we are in San Jose building at a rate never seen before.
Perhaps it is time to concider desaliation plants. Perhaps it is time to concider where that next bucket of water will come from.
We could all learn the ways of the Hupa,Kurok, and the Yurok tribes of our Northern Caliornia State, pray for what we really need, common sence!
The Village Black Smith
Greg#1: restricting building here will do 2 things: raise home prices even further, and the people will live elsewhere in California and the same amount of water will be needed. Since we cannot constitutionally keep citizens out of California, we’re going to have to start being water wise and move into desalinization. Hosing down sidewalks except with reclaimed water needs to become a crime.
Mr. Santos appears to have taken one from the Reed playbook—charge the taxpayers for your charitable contributions.
Boy, when is the next election for water Dist. Board? I’d like to hop on that gravy train. I could travel to exotic places abroad like Dubai and Israel, and France where they have dedsalinization plants to get educated on how to get them built…and all on someone else’s dough. Such a deal!
# 3
Jack the web site is http://www.acfnewsource.org/enviornment/
fog masters.
Space between fog & masters!
Sorry / Gil
Some of your criticisms are valid, but the degree of harshness is uncalled for. Tony Estremera and Greg Zlotnick could be driven into a deep state of depression because of your words. This depression could lead them to resign, or worse.
Greg #1 and John #4-
A home in the central valley uses much more water than a flat in San Jose. It’s drier, and you have more grass to irrigate.
If you really want to limit water use, you can’t just ban more housing. People will still live somewhere, and pushing them into the desert won’t reduce water use.
You have to build more water efficient homes and fewer water wasteful homes. That means more flats in San Jose and Mountain View, and fewer quarter acre lots in the central valley.
Folks,
Agriculture is the biggest water user (waster) in California. Cities and their population only use a minuscule amount of water compared to agriculture.
Come to think of it, agriculture is also the biggest employer of illegal aliens. Sounds like agriculture has been riding on the gravy train for to long, and now it is time for the farmers to clean up their act.
So, we’re supposed to cut back on water, use less electricity, and don’t drive our cars so that millions more can move into the valley? Something’s got to give…and that will be us in the form of higher taxes and lower living standards. The Village Blacksmith (#3) points out, “…yet here we are in SJ building at a rate never seen before.”
AND…you will have less of more (or more of less) if the San Jose RDA gets their way. In this morning’s report, the RDA officials spoke to their desire to have their funding caps lifted. (translation: more bonds!)
p.s. keep up the good work Jack. Do you have a bodyguard yet?
Pete Campbell
The following is a paragraph about salaries at the SCV Water District quoted from a story in the Merc today:
“About 310 of the district’s 795 employees earned six-figure salaries, including 11 who made more than $200,000. That’s a far higher percentage of workers making more than $100,000 than in either the city San Jose or Santa Clara County. District Chief Executive Officer Stanley Williams earned the most at his agency, with a gross salary of $241,000.”
Full story here:
http://www.mercurynews.com/localnewsheadlines/ci_6814722
We waste a lot of water, for example by expecting to have lawns that look like they came from Seattle. Give up on the lawns unless you use recycled water.
We could follow the example of Australia and start going back to the old rain-water tanks for non-drinking water. They could be topped up by recycled water as well. This would provide water for outside use and even for the washing machine. You could give a price break to people who install tanks.
The point about agriculture is well put. Why are we paying farmers massive subsidies to grow rice and cotton in the desert? How about buying these commodities from places that have a more suitable climate?
I noticed on a recent trip through the wine country that vineyards all seem to be set up for efficient use of water. Maybe some producers of other crops could do likewise.
I checked. That smelt has done nothing for me.
Funny how non-creationists are trying to keep evolution from happening.
What would be the harm if we smote the smelt? Would not nature infill with something else or create something new that would survive the new conditions?
Will we ration more water away from humans for willow trees? When will it end?
Feeling lower than a smelt’s , well, whatever is the lowest is of a smelt…
Well said, Greg #8.
But we REALLY need to educate the SoCal folks who water the hell out of everything, including their sidewalks, driveways, etc, with NORCAL water. The amount of cluelessness there is astounding.
Another problem—rice and cotton in the Central Valley—HUGE water consumers for small economic impact. We can’t just leave those farmers high and dry; perhaps we can get Fed. $$$ to buy them out like the feds did with commercial fishing boats working in overfished waters. But long term, they have to go.
Balance would help. The judge who ordered the water reductions to help the delta smelt placed that species’ survival above that of 20 million PEOPLE. I’d bet the plaintiff(s) in the case did their forum shopping well. While it’s always sad to see a species die off; frankly, the choice between the delta smelt and 20 million humans having drinking water would have come down differently if I were the judge.
If that decision spurs people to wake up and conserve, it was a good one. If not, the gamble by the judge was ill-conceived.
If you haven’t figured out where your drinking water comes from, perhaps you should know that it does not come from the local water company. They simply distribute it. With some possible exceptions. It all come from the North or East of us.
Think about every shower and toilet in Santa Clara Valley flushing at 7am day in and day out. Coffee, many glasses of drinking water every morning, No wonder these guys at the water co. take many trips to San Diego. It’s mind boggling! There’s got to be a therapist down there some where!
Worst case senerio, you’ll have a choice of coffee or taking a ;;;;;;.
Farmers won’t need water. Hell, they won’t have anyone to harvest what they plant anyway if Bush has his way. Order your radio active lettace from China.
Cotton? It’s probably is all being shipped to China anyway.
Corn? import it all from Mexico, just like our whole infrastructure is doing with goods from China.
The smelt, they were here first. But wait so were the Indians. Putting people before Smelt, stinks!
If we eliminate water for cotton, corn, and farming, we can continue the life style we are used to, and still allow the smelt to swim up stream.
Life is good. so what if the price of cucumbers and tomates goes as the gas market has tripled. At least we can flush with joy every am.
You keep building Barry we got you covered!
D.O.A.
Jack,
Thank you so much for addressing our water issues. Water has become the “gold” of the 21st Century, yet most people don’t recognize this. Chief among them are our politicians and planners.
Adding tens of thousands of new homes in the Santa Clara Valley greatly exacerbates the problem. Other counties, Monterey for example, have long restricted residential growth due to the imbalance in water availability.
It’s time that we do the same in our Valley of Heart’s Delight. As I’ve said many times, additional infrastructure requirements, chiefly water, transportation, schools and public safety, should be funded via a Mello-Roos assessment on developers and new residents.
I hope that you continue to address our water issues and provoke insightful discussions in this venue. Thanks again!
Lots of good thoughts and opinions. After reading them, I’d like to amend my suggestion by expanding the scope – all new residential developments throughout the entire State should be assessed a Mello-Roos type tax to pay for the needed incremental infrastructure.
I don’t believe that any constitutional issues would arise; additional homes create the need for costly additional resources… seems equitable to me.
See the editorial in today’s Mercury News:
http://www.mercurynews.com/opinion/ci_6814677
Lawns have to go, unless watered with reclaimed, non-potable water. Lawns are huge water consumers. Like the big area they just planted in grass between Coleman & 880—one sprinkler there has been broken for weeks. I see CSJ trucks driving by daily, but not one of the workers has corrected the sprinkler. Then there’s golf courses. Many have converted to reclaimed water, but they have a long way to go yet.Thousands of gallons wasted—I hope it’s at least reclaimed water.
The Lick fire and others are being fought with drinking water scooped out of reservoirs by choppers. I doubt it has much effect on the fire. It should be saved for drinking.
Jack,
Who sets the salaries for these people? Who sets the amount of money earned for Board Meetings, and who is overseeing their cash expenditures? I’m getting pretty sick and tired of reading how many government employees are getting outrageous salaries, while everything is going to hell in a hand basket, and taxpayers are footing the bill. Where is the oversight, and accountability?
As to building too much housing etc., at the cost of resources, this is America! The almighty buck will always win over common sense, our well being, at the cost of nature, and thousands of species of wild life. Many great writers over the centuries have tried to warn us, but as usual, no one in charge is listening.
By the way Jack, I’m so conservation cognizant that I brush my teeth in the shower, turn the water off in between brushing and rinsing! Change starts with the individual. If we depend on our leaders to do the right thing, we’d be screwed~
I agree that there need to be separate systems for drinking water and reclaimed water serving all homes. The huge expense associated with that kind of upgrade to the infrastructure is going to have to be dealt with at some point, but it’s just dumb to be using potable water for flushing toilets and watering landscaping.
#19- You may be correct that these outragous six figured salaries are the norm, but having a degree isn’t what fosters this kind of pay check. It’s getting to the point where flipping a hamburger will require an AA degree! Have you looked at what degrees a Council aide has to have, just to earn $28-35 K a year? Or what degrees and experience private sector jobs want for crap pay? It’s sickening.
#20- Of course our carelessness will make many of nature’s beauties disappear. Until such time that our over populated planet, filled with over fishing, over building, and draining of our most precious resources stops, every living thing will suffer.
“six-figure salaries” haven’t been “outrageous salaries” in this area for a long time, public or private.
http://cf.valleywater.org/About_Us/_Jobs/Salary_and_classification/jobclass.cfm
A quick glance at their pay scale reveals that those that top $100,000 are biologists, engineers, geologists, and other professional positions that require advanced degrees, in addition to the usual management positions.
I don’t think the ratio is out-of-line compare to other professional heavy units.(DA/PD/City Attorney/County Counsel with concentration of lawyers. County hospital with doctors/nurses/other allied professionals. Finance/Treasurer with accountants, etc.) If you look federal government, I am willing to bet that FDA have much higher ratio of employees earning six digit salary compare to Dept. of Homeland Security with its legion of TSA screeners. It’s apple and orange comparison, and unfair.
Some of the positions are unique without much private sector counterpart. But for more common classifications, the salary are not out-of-line, even a little bit lower by comparison.
Greg # 16—please tell me how your precious Mello-Roos type tax brings more water to California?
Your second paragraph is completely incomprehensible to me. Please explain to me in words of one syllable.
Kanchou # 19—your analysis of what a professional person should be paid is spot on. The problem isn’t that. The problem is, what on god’s green earth do these people actually do, other than travel around on OUR dime? We need some oversight person(s) on the taxpayers’ side to determine what these highly paid people do, and more imprtantly, is it necessary.
The public sector is crammed with highly paid sinecure jobs, with HUGE perks…none of which we need, and few of which are moderately productive.
Unfortunately, no-one has the time to scour budgets, check out job descriptions, in order to just fire these parasites.
#23 JMOC
The way I see it, Mr. Van Zandt muddled the water in #11 by bring up the salary level of SCVWD employees.
That’s separate from expenses for board members. So far, the reported issue for travel expense is for board members, and some board members have a very permissive definition of what’s constitute “outreach meeting.”
What I didn’t like is the “gotcha” attitude in #11. A (relatively) small agency, with narrow biology/ecology/engineering focused mandate, have much higher ratio of highly paid professional staff compare to larger, more generalized government agency. D’oh. How shocking, how outrageous?
I am glad you agree with me that pay scale itself is not the issue. It’s about are they actually good, and are they actually productive? I don’t have first hand knowledge on this issue. But all the news accounts so far are about the senior leaderships.(elected and appointed) I don’t think it’s fair to painting rank-and-file with broad brush based solely on the issues with elected board/executive management.
http://www.valleywater.org/About_Us/District_Info/index.shtm
“The Santa Clara Valley Water District manages Santa Clara County’s drinking water resources, coordinates flood protection for its 1.7 million residents, and serves as steward of the county’s more than 800 miles of streams and 10 district-built reservoirs.”
We haven’t heard much about their performance in fulfilling their mission. But it’s the kind of agency that you only heard about if something goes wrong, otherwise they are just faded into background. If Katrina and recent collapsing bridges taught us anything, is that you don’t save money by going cheap with engineers. Since we haven’t heard about them until now, either they were good or we were just lucky. I am hoping they are good.
To Jack 11,
So what does the salaries of SCVWD employees have to do with the lack of water resources? Droughts occur on a regular basis in the West. It’s understandable with the uncontrolled growth in the valley over the past 30 years people would eventually outstrip water resources. You can’t just blame the smelt and the degradation of their environment for the lack of water resources. Things you can do personally is conserve the resources that are available to you. Low flow shower heads, toilets, and drought tolerent landscaping, would enhance conservation efforts in the Bay area.
One solution would be dual plumbing for new homes and businesses that would utililize recycled water for flushing toilets and landscaping. This alone would stretch water resources for a very long time.
JMO (#23), ahhh, the sweet smell of burning tires and old gym socks – being lambasted by one who is clearly superior to the rest of us is always a reward!
It is indeed an honor to have you take another swipe at me. Now, let me explain my comments to those who might not be catching raindrops in their nostrils.
A Mello-Roos tax, Statewide, could fund the incremental infrastructure… to put it simply just for you, JMO, reservoirs.
Ok Jack, once again you are playing loose and fast with the facts.
The more I read your crap the more I realize how stupid you really are.
You spend time attacking a public engineering organization and ignore the fact that the stupid chump change of approx 150k over 3 years is just Silly Scott Herholds normal anti goverment rantings and lies. The fact that you point this sh** out but ignore the editorial that our water supply for silicon valley is at risk is CRAZY!!!
Are you fn serious? Sheesh what about our billion dollar economy.
You are a waste of time and your analysis is clearly not worth the amount you are getting paid to write this crap. You are a volunteer right?
Are you suggesting public engineers should be paid the wage you are paid for bad analysis, wait maybe you shold be one of the scientist, engineers or others designing our flood control or trying to ensure that we have water in this valley.
Get a life and be productive.
Take a swipe @ you, #26? My question was:“please tell me how your precious Mello-Roos type tax brings more water to California? ” You still haven’t answered the question. Water doesn’t come from reservoirs, Greg, just like milk doesn’t come from trucks. Water comes from rain and snow that fall in California. Building more reservoirs doesn’t make it rain or snow more, Greg. And as we have just seen in the Delta, a federal judge will cut off water to millions of folks to save a smelt. Just think what they’ll do if anyone tries to dam up a salmon or steelhead stream.
#24
The information quoted in #11 is relevant to my column and this discussion. They are just facts. I made no comment or judgement as to whether the salary levels are justified or not, so there is clearly no gotcha attitude. You bring up the salaries for engineers and geologists when nothing was even said about them. I agree with you that we need highly qualified people to do these jobs for a fair wage and I have no problem with that. What I do think is a problem is the freewheeling expense spending by the directors at the SCVWD. It’s obvious that they are taking advantage of their situation and the public ought to know about it.
The bigger and more important issue though is how we deal with the water supply situation in our area. What can we do as individuals and a community to deal with what may quickly reach crisis stage? And, can the SCVWD board handle the situation? They don’t exactly inspire public confidence when they pull one fast one after another.
#22
It’s about supplies and demands. But good engineers are worth the money.
Not all the classification I saw have clear private sector equivalent. But for those that does, and in the area I am familiar, the pay scale is lower than market rate.
For example, the geologist. With the high gas price, there are lots of exploration efforts that drove up the compensation of trained geologists. Of course, people must weight cyclical industry like energy compare to stable government positions. But while they don’t have to match, government employers still need to keep pace to retain good people.
The recent attention paid to the Water District was triggered by a single action.
The CEO of the Water District hired a Board Member for a high salaried position in a covert manner. There was no advertisement of the position and no competitive selection process.
The San Jose Mercury News was rightly outraged about this action—as were Water District employees when they heard about the hiring.
Somehow this improper behavior on the part of the CEO and the Board Member is being attributed to rank and file staff as well.
The staffers are not happy with the behavior of either the CEO or many of the Board Members. So please don’t take your anger out on employees. They are not the ones making the hiring decisions or approving Board Member expense reports.
Unfortunately employees are the ones that are out in the public eye and are taking the heat for all of this.