San Diego Offers Water Hotline to Report Water Wastage

By Alison St John / Reporter, KPBS Public Broadcasting

Published August 8, 2008 at 12:54 PM PDT

This story was published more than 15 years ago.

San Diego City's water hotline: (619)515 3500, then press 5. San Diego Mayor Jerry Sanders warns city residents that the voluntary water conservation measures now in effect could become mandatory w

San Diego Mayor Jerry Sanders warns city residents that the voluntary water conservation measures now in effect could become mandatory within a year. KPBS reporter Alison St John has more.

Sanders says water shortages could mean job losses down the line. San Diego is the first city in the county to declare a "Stage One Water Watch" which means voluntary water conservation.

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Sanders : But we know that if we don’t have a good winter, that we’ll probably have to go to mandatory water conservation early next year.

The city has a new hotline - ( 619 ) 515 3500 - to report wasteful water use. Sanders says if it's your next door neighbor, there’s no need to turn them in.

Sanders : I’d encourage people to knock on their neighbor’s door and say, "your sprinkler’s broken," rather than calling the water department to do it! We’ll go out and do it, but neighbors need to talk to neighbors about these issues .

Sanders says well over half of water used in San Diego is on outdoor landscaping .

He says rate increases from the County Water Authority will have to be passed on to consumers, so expect water to cost more by early next year. He says the water reclamation project the city council has approved will cost 11 million dollars and that will have to be factored into the rate increase.

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Alison St John KPBS news.

The water hotline is 515 3500

Alison St John

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Alison St John currently serves as a general assignment reporter and occasionally co-hosts KPBS Midday Edition. She fell in love with KPBS Radio when she arrived in San Diego in 1985 and first heard NPR. She has been a voice on KPBS Radio since 1989, and has served as a news reporter for radio, TV and the web, as well as anchoring, hosting, producing and editing. Alison has reported on stories about North County and was based in the KPBS' North County Bureau. Alison covered the metro beat during the critical period of the San Diego City pension crisis, and the education beat while Alan Bersin was the controversial Superintendent of San Diego City School District. She covered health when the industry was converting to managed care and told welfare reform stories in the late 1990s when Clinton was “ending welfare as we know it.” She has covered land use issues extensively, looking at the challenges of meeting a growing population while preserving community character, and developing a better transportation system to meet environmental concerns. She has done many stories on the military in San Diego, and the series she edited on the challenges veterans face returning from active duty to civilian life won “Best of Show” from the San Diego Society of Professional Journalists. She occasionally hosts the KPBS Roundtable and KPBS Midday Edition. Alison has won awards from the San Diego Press Club, the Society of Professional Journalists, the Associated Press TV and Radio Association, and the California Golden Mike Awards. Alison was born in Tanzania, brought up in Scotland, and earned her degree in psychology and sociology from Durham University in England. Her postgraduate diploma is in student counseling. She worked in England, Nigeria, Switzerland, Belgium, India, and Japan before moving to the United States in 1981. She now lives in Oceanside and enjoys how her community is growing and changing.