This month, our water bill came in as “Efficient” from Coachella Valley Water District. That’s good, meaning we are meeting the District’s very tight water reduction standards. There are HOAs who made a decision to overseed and keep watering, and they have had thousands to tens of thousands of dollars in penalties. When our Board made the decision to comply with the emergency standards, it’s because we didn’t want to have each unit to have between $80 and $240 in emergency assessments per month. In retrospect, we definitely made the right decision.
Like all of you, we’d love to see this tight water situation go away, so that we can have beautiful grass again. No one is sure if El Nino will save us, especially since rain has been largely scarce this month. But everyone we’ve spoken to says we should definitely plan a long-term solution to water conservation. It’s no longer 1976 water-wise. We are continually looking at several long-term solutions. These are difficult decisions, as landscaping is one of our most important resources. Our decisions are not made in a vacuum, nor are they arbitrary. If you are concerned about landscaping, come to board meetings to learn the real costs of everything, and express your thoughts during the open forum segment of our monthly board meetings.