Focus on the Future

Building Resilience for Continued Water Reliability

Calleguas Municipal Water District was founded in 1953 during a time of rapid development in southeastern Ventura County. When Calleguas first joined the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California (Metropolitan), it received water imported from the Colorado River. In the early 1970s Calleguas began delivering imported water from the State Water Project (SWP) into Ventura County, and for years this supply was abundant enough to meet the needs of Calleguas’s service area. Weather patterns were less extreme and droughts were shorter and less frequent than they are today. However, in the last quarter century southern California, and the western United States as a whole, have experienced changes that have impacted the availability and reliability of the water supplies that were historically relied upon.

Calleguas is meeting this changing future with innovative, collaborative approaches to water management. Read on for more information on the water challenges facing local communities and Calleguas’s ongoing work to plan for long-term water reliability and resilience.

Learn more about Calleguas’s efforts to build resilience in its service area.

Interconnections

Salinity Management Pipeline

Landscape Transformation

Water Use Efficiency

Diversifying Our Water Supply Portfolio to Adapt to the Continuing Effects of Climate Change and More Frequent and Severe Droughts 

As hydrologic conditions change in California, infrastructure that was built for more moderate conditions becomes less effective at conveying water where and when it’s needed most. Over the last decade, an increasingly wild swing between wet and dry years, often dubbed “weather whiplash,” has revealed vulnerabilities in current water supply sources. 

For example, when the SWP first began delivering water in the 1960s, it was mostly able to meet its delivery goals. However, over the last two decades, average deliveries have dropped to only 50-60% of contracted amounts and, in some years, those deliveries have been as low as 5%. 

Several factors have contributed to the SWP’s declining reliability, including:

  • Stronger environmental regulations in the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta that introduced new pumping restrictions and limited how much and when water can be exported.
  • More frequent droughts, declining snowpack, and shifts in the timing of runoff into water supply reservoirs due to climate change, all of which have reduced water availability.
  • Warmer winters that result in more precipitation falling as rain rather than snow and snowpack that melts earlier, causing pulses of runoff that do not always align with when water is needed or when it can be stored.
  • Aging infrastructure, California Aqueduct capacity constraints caused by subsidence, and a Delta levee system that is vulnerable to earthquakes, sea level rise, and storm surges, which raise additional concerns about long-term delivery reliability. 

The SWP currently provides almost all of Calleguas’s water supply, and in 2022 it delivered such a small amount of water that Metropolitan enacted an Emergency Water Conservation Plan for Calleguas and five other Metropolitan member agencies that primarily receive water from the SWP. As a result, all of Calleguas’s retail water providers that served imported water during that time had to require their customers to limit outdoor watering to one day per week to conserve the limited supply available. Although the mandatory water restrictions were lifted less than a year later following intense winter storms, Calleguas’s Board of Directors determined that the District needed to diversify its water sources. While imported water will always be essential to Ventura County, the Board recognized that building a resilient water future for the region must include a more diverse portfolio of supply, storage, conveyance, and programs.

The Calleguas Board of Directors adopted the “New Model for Resilience” Strategic Plan in 2023. Since then, the District has engaged in a series of collaborative, iterative, and productive conversations with local and regional partners to envision and plan for long-term water reliability and resilience. This process, the Water Resources Implementation Strategy (WRIST), has built on the history of extensive regional collaboration to enhance existing partnerships and forge new ones. The goal of WRIST was to develop preferred portfolios of projects with a regional focus and evaluate them according to multiple criteria and priorities. With those portfolios identified, Calleguas is now embarking on the early stages of planning for implementation of the selected conceptual projects and programs to diversify and strengthen its water supply. Potential future investments under consideration include:

  • Developing new local water supplies, such as making use of brackish (slightly salty) groundwater by constructing new desalter facilities
  • Extending Calleguas’s water delivery system to allow locally produced water to be conveyed to all parts of the service area
  • Groundwater storage programs to store water from wet periods so it is available during dry ones
  • Maximizing the use of recycled water through advanced treatment and groundwater injection and extraction, as well as expanding existing recycled water (“purple pipe”) systems
  • Interconnections with other water districts 

Weather whiplash also underscores the need to enhance the ability to capture and store water during times of abundant precipitation for use during the longer and more frequent droughts that will occur. Calleguas supports projects, such as the Delta Conveyance Project (DCP) and Sites Reservoir, to maximize the State’s ability to capture and store water when it is available for when it is needed most.

Implementing a Robust Capital Improvement Program to Address Aging Infrastructure

Calleguas’s current water infrastructure includes over 130 miles of pipelines (ranging from 24 inches to 78 inches in diameter); numerous tanks, wells, pump stations, and backup generators; an emergency water supply reservoir (Lake Bard); and a treatment plant, plus all of the other components that deliver water to the 19 retail water purveyors that provide drinking water for three-quarters of Ventura County’s population – that’s 650,000 people. This population has grown substantially over the decades, and much of the Calleguas infrastructure was constructed in the early 1960s and 1970s, making it more than 50 years old.

Calleguas employs a comprehensive inspection and maintenance program to keep its facilities in excellent condition, but system components have a finite lifespan and replacements or upgrades are necessary as they near the end of that life to minimize the chance of leaks, mechanical or electrical breakdowns, or other failures. Just as previous generations invested in the current water system, continued investment in water infrastructure is essential to ensure continued reliability now and in the future.

Advocating for Equitable and Effective Solutions to Modern Water Supply Challenges

Calleguas continues to advocate for solutions at the local, regional, state, and federal levels to support water resilience. The External Affairs Department actively works with legislators, advocacy groups, other water districts, and other stakeholders to support legislation that is fair, feasible, and effective. Calleguas supports important state-level projects like the DCP through coordination with stakeholders and elected officials. 

Calleguas has also been instrumental in advocating for infrastructure investments to increase reliability and provide a more equitable supply of water to those Metropolitan member agencies in areas where Metropolitan currently delivers almost exclusively water from the SWP. These projects include the Sepulveda Feeder Pump Stations Project, which will push Colorado River water and stored supplies from Diamond Valley Lake – Southern California’s largest reservoir – into communities that currently have limited access to these resources, including Calleguas’s service area.

Increasing Water Use Efficiency and Conservation to Address Growing Demands for Limited Water

Calleguas promotes conservation, education, and public awareness programs through its website, social media sites, tours, and speaking engagements. It also offers rebates for water-efficient appliances, weather-based irrigation controllers, efficient sprinkler nozzles, various commercial equipment, and more. Rebates are also available through the popular Turf Replacement Program. See BeWaterWise.com for more information and to apply for rebates. 

Calleguas is a co-sponsor of VenturaCountyGardening.com and developed the Garden Landscapes for Ventura County guide. Both are excellent resources to inspire the community in southern Ventura County to replace thirsty turfgrass with climate-appropriate plants to create a beautiful, resilient landscape that conserves water and supports local biodiversity.

Calleguas is actively involved in a variety of programs designed to increase public awareness of water resource issues and encourage water use efficiency within the community, including native plant and rain barrel sales, information fairs, climate-appropriate landscaping and turf removal classes, drip irrigation workshops, and California-friendly demonstration gardens. All in-person and online classes and workshops are offered free of charge. Check the Meetings and Events calendar on the home page for upcoming events.

Staff Photo