Item 28 - Urban Water Management Plan and Water Shortage Contingency Plan

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Santa Ana 2020 Urban Water Management Plan arcadis.com ES-1 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY INTRODUCTION AND UWMP OVERVIEW The City of Santa Ana prepared this 2020 Urban Water Management Plan (UWMP) to submit to the California Department of Water Resources (DWR) to satisfy the UWMP Act of 1983 (UWMP Act or Act) and subsequent California Water Code (Water Code) requirements. The City is a retail water supplier that provides water to its residents and other customers using the imported potable water supply obtained from its regional wholesaler, Metropolitan Water District of Southern California (MET), local groundwater from the Orange County Groundwater Basin (OC Basin), and recycled water from the Orange County Water District (OCWD). UWMPs are comprehensive documents that present an evaluation of a water supplier’s reliability over a long-term (20-25 year) horizon. This 2020 UWMP provides an assessment of the present and future water supply sources and demands within the City’s service area. It presents an update to the 2015 UWMP on the City’s water resource needs, water use efficiency programs, water reliability assessment and strategies to mitigate water shortage conditions. It also presents a new 2020 Water Shortage Contingency Plan (WSCP) designed to prepare for and respond to water shortages. This 2020 UWMP contains all elements to meet compliance of the new requirements of the Act as amended since 2015. UWMP PREPARATION The City coordinated the preparation of this 2020 UWMP with other key entities, including MET (regional wholesaler for Southern California and the direct supplier of imported water to the City, Municipal Water District of Orange County ([MWDOC] (regional wholesale supplier for OC)), and OCWD (OC Basin manager and provider of recycled water in north OC). While the City is not a member agency of MWDOC, the City developed this UWMP in conjunction with other MWDOC-led efforts such as population projection from the Center for Demographic Research at California State University Fullerton (CDR). SYSTEM DESCRIPTION Governed by a non-partisan seven-member City Council, the City is one of the oldest cities in Orange County, incorporated in 1886 and became an original member agency of the MET on February 27, 1931. The City’s water service area covers 27.5 square miles and includes the City of Santa Ana and a small neighborhood in the City of Orange, near Tustin Avenue and Fairhaven by the northeast corner of Santa Ana. The City operates ten reservoirs with a storage capacity of 49 million gallons (MG), seven pumping stations, 21 groundwater wells, four pressure regulating stations and seven import water connections and manages 510-mile water mains system with 45,037 service connections. Situated in the South Coast Air Basin (SCAB), the City’s climate is characterized by Southern California’s “Mediterranean” climate with mild winters, warm summers and moderate rainfall. Regarding land use, the City is predominantly single and multi-family residential community. Moving forward, the City will continue planning for its Regional Housing Needs Assessment (RHNA) allocation and future planned developments beyond 2020 will primarily be multiuse projects, in the ‘focus areas’ identified in the City’s General Plan. The current population of 335,086 is projected to increase by 2.9% over the next 25 years.