Lake Merced Update -- December 2002

To: Friends of Lake Merced:

Where's the rain?  This is supposed to be a wet, El Nino year, but so far not so good.

Some good news: Katie Pilat has completed her study of lakes in San Francisco sponsored by the Neighborhood Parks Council.  A short, pre-publication version of her report, "Leaving a Lake Legacy," is available on the web site.  We're working on preparing a web-friendly version of the entire report that won't take so long to download.  It's well worth a read.

A couple of weeks ago I attended a session of the California Recycled Water Task Force, chaired by the state Department of Water Resources and the Department of Health Services.  There is a lot of energy going into the support of recycling, and one important application is aquifer recharge.  There are some 200 active recycling projects in the state, and just a bit more than 10% of those are employed for that purpose.

We've got a great opportunity here at Lake Merced.  We've got surplus recycled water coming on line when the Daly City plant is complete in 2004.  We've got access to recharge wells at each of the three golf clubs just south of Lake Merced.  We have a real need to build a water barrier between the lake and the wells to the south.  There is state money available to develop projects of this sort, and Prop A provides an additional $103 million earmarked for recycling.  Finally, according to the draft regulations we are likely to qualify for this application.

By their own testimony the PUC does not have an active plan for their recycling program.  They do, however, have an active person, Cheryl Munoz, Senior Water Resources Specialist according to her card, assigned to developing this plan.  We look forward to working with Cheryl to make this program a reality.

There is a new section on the web site (www.lakemerced.org) devoted to recycling.  This includes status reports on existing programs, rules and regs for developing new applications, sources of funding, and whatever else seems relevant.  Please take a look, and let me know if there are other resources that we should make available.

That's all for this month.  Have a great holiday and we'll be in touch next year.

John