Protection of MCWD’s water is a paramount focus.
We need to cooperate regionally to assure an adequate and affordable water supply for both the Monterey Peninsula and Marina Coast Water District’s service areas of Marina and former Fort Ord. Expansion of Pure Water Monterey, when combined with conservation and other water management strategies is the viable and affordable solution.
CalAm has erroneously characterized its Monterey Peninsula Water Supply Project planned for the CEMEX site in Marina as desalination. It is not. The project is not designed to pump seawater from under the ocean floor.
Instead, the wells will take water from the 180-400’ aquifer of the already overdrafted Salinas Valley Groundwater Basin. CalAM has no legal rights to this water and science supports the predictable outcome is increasing saltwater intrusion.
I have been a regional leader for the protection of MCWD’s source water and advocating for an alternative regional solution. When CalAm sought a permit for its test well in 2014, I vehemently argued against council approval, when the mayor and others voted to approve. Despite securing a 3-2 vote to deny the permit, the Coastal Commission overturned the decision on appeal.
I introduced Stanford Professor Rosemary Knight with her “state of the science” geophysical imaging of saltwater intrusion to the city and to Marina Coast Water District’s Executive Director, Keith Van Der Maaten. This introduction resulted in better scientific review and proof the CalAm project will cause irreparable harm to Marina’s affordable water.
The fight is not over.
“Water is a human right and must be treated as a public utility, not controlled by “for-profit” entities. Privatization undermines the human right to water. The costs of water must be limited to the cost of providing it, and no more. The Pure Water Monterey Expansion is feasible; doesn’t have the negative impact to Marina’s groundwater and coast; is environmentally just; and can be online well before any desalination project.”