Off Mic

Whenever someone brought up the topic of water (or, more accurately, the lack of water) as a possibility for a documentary or a feature for Full Focus , my eyelids would start to droop. This indifference persisted in spite of my near-adoration of Jon Else's wonderful four-part public television series Cadillac Desert , which was all about water and the West. Yes, yes, I knew water was important, scarce, political, whatever. But I was dead certain water was a terribly boring topic, one to be taken up only when there was no choice.

So one day, I was given no choice. The assignment (part of Tapped Out , an Envision San Diego special on water that airs Thursday Oct. 18th at 8 p.m.) was to put 200 years of San Diego water history -- drought and flood, plans and schemes, usage and policy -- into perspective. And I was to do it in four minutes and 45 seconds.

The experience was like finding out that the quiet neighbor you thought was a CPA really rustles cattle for a living. Water and how we live with it is every bit as interesting as human beings are.

I discovered that water was always a problem in this region, both too much of it and too little. I learned who was good at conserving it (the Kumeyaay, the mission padres) and who was good at wasting it (Alonzo Horton). I learned that the quest for a permanent source of good water for San Diego seems to have gone hand-in-hand with the desire to have a railroad run through it. I found out that there were dozens of discoveries of "permanent" sources of water for San Diego, some of which tasted bad and smelled worse. I learned that there is no such thing as going too far for water and generally no concern about whether other people have any. If we can take all the water before it gets to the river mouth, great. If you happen to live where the Colorado River ends, too bad.

And most of all, I learned that if we are going to continue to live in paradise, to keep building and growing, we must finally learn to adapt to the climate we love and live with the most stringent conservation measures we can devise.

We have no choice.

John
October 21, 2007 at 10:16 PM
Having lived in Europe and the Bay area, it's obvious to anyone outside onlooker that San Diego's efforts at water conservation, as well as it's other conservation efforts, are a joke. For example, I have been trying to use the kerbside yard waste recycling for months, and they don't even bother to pick it up - I gave up after contacting the council several times. Voluntary water conservation will not work, unless the cost of water rises dramatically. We know that a major water crisis is coming, and can't afford to wait until it arrives before we mandate water use reductions. We should have a complete and immediate ban on lawn spinklers except where only recycled water is used. Lawn sprinklers are an insane waste of drinking water in a coastal desert area like this, and lawns are purely cosmetic. Other drought resistant plants would be just fine instead of thirsty lawns. This has worked well in other cities in the west, so why not here? The sooner we ban lawns the better as far as I am concerned. -----

Jay
October 26, 2007 at 12:01 AM
We have other concerns now, with the fires. I learned long ago that water is a precious resource; cultures die and thrive over water. I always stop to speak with anyone washing their driveway, always have. Some mandatory, high profile, well publicized, effort has to occur before the majority of San Diegans will wake up to knowledge they have to do something more... Something more...if they want to have water coming out of their taps day, after day. Something has to give, or people have to begin to show that they really do care. Yelling at each other does not help. All of us live here; it is up to each, and every one of us, to do everything we can to change the culture of how we use water.

Skot
October 27, 2007 at 03:32 AM
Gee Pat, sorry to have been such a drip all all these years with my insistence a history of the efforts to bring water to the region would make for good tv. I know you thought I was all wet! And while your four minute piece for Envision flowed well, it did little more than...uh, whet my appetite. So howzabout plunging in and floating the idea of a full length documentary on the subject--in high definition! Seems like a great story to tell in depth and might make for some pretty compelling images considering how ravaged the area is in the wake of these fires. Besides, you don't REALLY want to pull the plug on such a sparkling career and retire, do you? P.S. Have I mentioned what global warming and rising ocean levels will do to the Salton Sea of Cortez?