Water
By Walter Moore, Candidate for Mayor of Los Angeles, WalterMooreForMayor.com
Villaraigosa says there is a water shortage. His plan for dealing with it was to announce 10 ways you can reduce your use (e.g., shorter showers).
Assuming for the sake of argument that there is, in fact, a water shortage, we should instead pursue more serious measures, one concerning demand, and one concerning supply:
Friday, July 20, 2007
First of all, we should stop trying to cram more people into the City’s 469 square miles. More people means more demand for water. Let’s not increase the demand for a scarce resource.
Then again, I oppose increased density regardless of how much water we have. The quality of life in L.A. has deteriorated significantly due to overcrowding. I oppose further over-crowding -- which career politicians call “smart growth” so you’ll feel stupid if you oppose their spending your tax dollars to give subsidies to the developers who contribute to their campaigns.
Second, if we need more water, we should seriously consider having DWP build a desalination plant. Having researched the matter for a good 30 minutes or so, it appears that water produced from desalination costs from two to three times more than what we pay now. But water is so cheap as it is -- except for the bottled variety -- it’s still a bargain.
If we have a serious, long-term water shortage, we should start building a plant sooner rather than later. Better to have water at a higher price than to have no water at all.
My half-hour of research also indicates we could build a plant that would serve around 200,000 people for approximately $269 million -- less than Villaraigosa and City Hall are giving away to the “L.A. Live” developers. The people of Perth, Australia built a plant that size for $324 million Australian dollars, which works out to $269 million U.S.
On the other hand, a plant in Perth is apparently costing over a billion, so we need to do at least another good hour or so of research before breaking out the checkbook.
But here’s the point: serious problems require serious solution. If you make me your Mayor, I will work to come up with realistic, practical solutions to our public policy problems. If there’s a water shortage, I won’t pretend that telling you to take shorter showers is a solution.
