Moscow's water policy

[Priscilla Salant <psalant@moscow.com>]

Visionaries,

To encourage water conservation, it seems to me we have three options.

First, we can regulate water use as we're doing now (presumably on a
temporary basis).  If you water when it's not your day, you get fined. This
option seems somewhat inflexible, given the experiences of the household
that wasn't allowed to water their newly seeded lawn, and John G's getting
raked over the coals for not turning off his sprinklers when he was sick.

Second, we can rely on people's environmental conscience.  We would have to
trust ourselves to act in the best interests of the community.
Unfortunately, now that I've discovered the magic of watering regularly and
wastefully this summer, I hardly trust my own environmental conscience let
alone anyone else's.

And third, we can raise water rates, thus providing financial incentives to
conserve.  The more you use, the more you pay.  Not only would that
decrease demand (if rates were increased enough), it would also generate
enough money to maintain the system without running a deficit.

Or so one would expect.  Last night's Daily News reported that the city
looked at moving to a rate structure that would reward people for saving.
However, staff found that "conservation rates wouldn't bring in enough to
keep the utility solvent."

I don't understand how this could be the case.  And I'd like to know what
others think about implementing a new rate structure in lieu of regulating
and just plain hoping people do the right thing.

Priscilla Salant