PORT TOWNSEND — Watering will be restricted to every other day as of Tuesday if the City Council approves a revised drought contingency response plan Monday.
Revised Stage 1 restrictions will come into effect immediately upon passage, said City Manager David Timmons on Friday.
But a shutdown of the Port Townsend Paper mill, which is by far the largest user of city water as well as being Jefferson County’s largest employer, is not likely to be considered until October, he said.
Council consideration of the revised plan is on the agenda for the 6:30 p.m. Monday meeting in council chambers at City Hall, 540 Water St.
On July 20, the council approved an emergency declaration concerning water supply and fire hazards. Members also directed staff to bring them a revised plan.
The proposed revised drought plan consolidates Stages 1 and 2 into the first stage, and Stages 3 and 4 into Stage 3.
The new Stage 4 isn’t really a stage, according to Timmons.
“It’s Armageddon,” he said.
“If we get to that point in City Lake” a Chimacum backup for city water, “it would be around a January time frame, and we would have to consider water rationing.”
Stage 1 would put into effect alternate watering days and other measures within the city limits to reach targets of a 10 percent reduction in water use within the city and a 15 percent cutback in consumption for the Port Townsend Paper mill.
“One of the concerns is that people didn’t want to stop watering their vegetables,” Timmons said. “That’s why we have watering every other day.”
Stage 2 restrictions — which would include ceasing operations at the paper mill, which employs 295 people — are not likely to be considered for several months, Timmons said.
“If all things stay the same as right now, we project that the water supply will last until roughly about October,” he said.
The trigger for Stage 2 is when Lords Lake — a Quilcene reservoir that, along with City Lake, serves as a backup city water supply — falls to 3 feet.
Lords Lake is now at about 37 feet, Timmons said.
“During Stage 2, the mill will have to cease operations,” he said.
Port Townsend Paper Corp. plans a one-week shutdown of the mill in October for maintenance.
“The question will be what the status of the water will be in October to determine whether or not they can resume operations,” Timmons said.
“When [Lords Lake] gets down to about 10 feet, we will ask the mill for an action plan,” he said.
Felix Vicino, Port Townsend Paper Corp.’s human resources director, has declined to provide details about how many employees would be laid off or retained if the mill must shut down.
The mill has lowered its consumption from 15 million to 10 million gallons daily and is working on greater conservation, Kevin Scott, director of sustainability at the mill, has said.
“We hope to get it down to 8 million,” Timmons said.
“The more conservation measures the mill can take and reduce their water consumption, the more secure all of us will be.”
Mill officials “are taking it very seriously,” he added.
The city uses from 1 million to 1.3 million gallons daily in the summer, with water use sliding down to about 800,000 gallons daily after September, Timmons estimated.
“Once the mill is in a situation where it has to cease operations, we’re projecting the city will have more than two months’ supply, which will take us through to the end of the year,” he said.
But it’s possible that day will come later than expected, or perhaps never.
“It’s kind of a moving target. If we get rain in September or October, we could stay in Stage 1 for a longer term,” Timmons said.
The city draws its water from the Big Quilcene and Little Quilcene rivers, both fed by Olympic Mountain snowpack, which is nonexistent this year.
The city uses Lords Lake in Quilcene and City Lake in Chimacum as backups when the rivers no longer meet water needs.
Both Jefferson and Clallam counties are in severe drought, according to the U.S. Drought Monitor.
Dry conditions raise the risk of fire.
On Monday, the council will consider a fire response plan that would allow the city to act quickly to remove hazardous conditions such as tall grass or overgrowth and trash on abandoned properties.
The city already has experienced a two-week reprieve, Timmons said.
“We got some rainfall last week in the mountains,” he said. “We were able to put some water back in” the reservoirs.
About a month ago, the state Department of Ecology also allowed the city to expand the Lords Lake reservoir by raising the spillway 3 feet.
That buys the city some time, Timmons said.
The city water situation now is similar to that of summer 2009, he said.
“It gives us some experience, so that’s why we feel comfortable in our projections,” he said.
Among action taken has been a reconciliation of the mill’s meters with those of the city.
That took care of an apparent missing 1 million to 2 million gallons of water.
“It wasn’t a leak,” Timmons said; the discrepancy was because of an inaccurate meter.
Also, the city has identified top users of water — aside from the mill — and is making contact with them.
The Port Townsend Golf Club has been restricted to watering tees and greens for about the past two weeks, Timmons said.
The military cemetery at Fort Worden is another large user since it is watered daily.
“We’re trying to contact the military” to change that, Timmons said.
In addition, many residents have complied with a request for voluntary conservation, he said.
“A lot of lawns are going brown. A lot of people have cut back in that respect,” he said.
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Managing Editor/News Leah Leach can be reached at 360-417-3531 or at leah.leach@peninsuladailynews.com.
Sequim-Dungeness Valley Editor Chris McDaniel contributed to this report.
