PORT ANGELES — Scanty snowpack in the Olympic Mountains hasn’t prompted city officials to consider immediate conservation measures.
The city siphons off too little water from the Elwha River to substantially affect its flow through conservation, the city’s Utility Advisory Committee was told Tuesday.
That means Port Angeles shouldn’t rescind its so-called “flat rate” of $2 per 100 cubic feet, at least not until autumn, said Philip Lusk, deputy director of power and telecommunications systems.
The city adopted the flat rate and abandoned a three-tier rate structure last fall to encourage people to garden and water their lawns.
The tiered system charged proportionately more money for more consumption.
Warm temperatures have retarded snowpack at higher elevations this winter to about 8 percent of normal.
When snowpack melts in the summer, it keeps rivers flowing.
No place to store
Even if the city saved water against an anticipated drought, it has no place to store it now that reservoirs on the Elwha River have been released through the demolition of two dams.
As for what the city takes from the Elwha, “it is a tiny, tiny piece of the river even at its lowest flow,” said City Councilman Lee Whetham, one of three City Council members who serves on the panel.
The city, however, can continue to encourage conservation through the shower restrictors, faucet aerators and toilet restrictors it offers customers for free, Lusk said, and to allow residents to capture rain in barrels.
In the meantime, people either can consume water or let it flow into the Strait of Juan de Fuca.
“The early fall is the point we begin to become concerned,” Lusk said.
Historically, the river flows at its lowest in mid-September.
The city last declared a water shortage in 2006 but didn’t repeat the strictures despite the Elwha River falling to similar levels four times since then, Lusk said.
As for current use, “the trend line is decreasing,” he said.
“We’ve gone from roughly 5 cubic feet per second [at the city water treatment plant] to about 3.5 in 2015. This is a 25 percent reduction.”
The city’s “flat rate” experiment will run through 2016.
Last summer, “only a handful” of homeowners used more than 1,000 cubic feet of water on their lawns and gardens, said Whetham, who supports the program.
The City Council adopted it to “green up” the city. Lusk said the “flat rate” was “an effort brought by citizens to bring a different look to how the city presents itself.”
“We’ve got a problem of a brown community,” Whetham said Tuesday.
Coarse glacier soils don’t retain the region’s plenteous rainfall but allow it to drain away.
Calls from residents
City Councilman Brad Collins, however, said the city should reconsider the tiered program in light of calls to City Hall from residents concerned about saving water.
“I think it should be put in front of the council,” he said.
“But that doesn’t mean everyone is going to vote for it.”
For now, rain continues to feed the 321-square-mile Elwha watershed, Lusk said.
“There’s still much more rain to fall that will flow down the Elwha,” he said.
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Reporter James Casey can be reached at 360-452-2345, ext. 5074, or at jcasey@peninsuladailynews.com
