Water Supply

Poseidon is offering Huntington Beach a discounted water supply in hopes of securing approval for its desalination facility at Monday's meeting. Officials with the Connecticut-based company said they're prepared to sell Huntington Beach three million gallons of water per day at a rate 5% cheaper than it currently pays the Municipal Water District of Orange County if the city gives it a conditional use permit to build a $250-million desalination plant behind the AES power plant at Newland Avenue and Pacific Coast Highway.

In 1992, the United Nations designated March 22 as World Water Day. The first celebration was in 1993. That’s why you may have noticed increased media coverage of water lately. For example, the entire April issue of National Geographic is devoted to water stories. One article, “California’s Pipe Dream: A heroic system of dams, pumps and canals can’t stave off a water crisis,” is about Southern California. Southern California is in a real water crisis, and it’s not going to go away.

WHAT HAPPENED: The City Council gave the City of Huntington Beach Community Facilities District its approval for the district to issue $16 million in bonds for use in the current construction of the Hyatt Regency Huntington Beach Resort and Spa, a 517-room hotel and conference center at Pacific Coast Highway and Pacific View Avenue set to open in January 2003. WHAT IT MEANS: The bonds will be issued in the next couple of months, and be paid by PCH Beach Resorts, LLC, the owner and developer of the resort, and the long-term leaseholder of the property.

Vic and I attended the Newport Beach Film Festival this past weekend. Naturally, Vic and I focused on environmental documentaries. We saw three films, "A Fierce Green Fire,""Last Call at the Oasis,"and"Bitter Seeds. " "A Fierce Green Fire" is based on the book of the same name. The film explored the history of environmentalism from John Muir's failed attempt to save the Hetch Hetchy valley north of Yosemite from being dammed, up to today's battle to slow global warming.

What a great summer this has been for us. We just returned from Vic's last summer natural history field trip for adults, this one to Lone Pine in the Eastern Sierras. I help him teach this class. We searched Owens Valley, Whitney Portal, the Alabama Hills and the White Mountains for bristlecone pines, sagebrush lizards, and other interesting plants and animals. The Inyo complex of fires was out, but the 35,176 acres that were burned provided yet another topic of discussion. On July 6, lightning strikes ignited 10 separate fires in the tinder-dry sagebrush.