{"id":17465,"date":"2013-11-26T14:24:09","date_gmt":"2013-11-26T20:24:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/?p=17465"},"modified":"2013-11-26T14:24:09","modified_gmt":"2013-11-26T20:24:09","slug":"okc-steps-up-water-conservation-effort-levying-fines-and-giving-skeptics-hope","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/2013\/11\/26\/okc-steps-up-water-conservation-effort-levying-fines-and-giving-skeptics-hope\/","title":{"rendered":"OKC Steps Up Water Conservation Effort, Levying Fines and Giving Skeptics Hope"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"A<\/a><\/p>\n

Joe Wertz \/ StateImpact Oklahoma<\/p>\n

A grounded boat dock at Canton Lake, where Oklahoma City got billions of gallons of water in early 2013.<\/p>\n<\/div>

The Oklahoma City Water Utilities Trust has taken a lot of criticism the past few years over how it’s gone about securing enough water to meet the city’s needs.<\/p>

Efforts to import more water from southeast Oklahoma have been met with stiff resistance<\/a> there, and the OCWUT isn’t very popular in Canton, Okla., either, after Oklahoma City drained billions of gallons<\/a> of water from Canton Lake for its own use earlier this year.<\/p>

One of the biggest complaints StateImpact has heard from residents in Canton and southeast Oklahoma: Oklahoma City should conserve the water it has before taking it from them.<\/p>

And according M. Scott Carter’s story<\/a> in\u00a0The Journal Record,\u00a0<\/em>the OCWUT says it took those complaints to heart and it’s Progressive Water Conservation Program \u2014 which started in May \u2014 is proof:<\/p>\n

Under the program, water conservation is mandatory all year. Residents whose address numbers end in an even number may water their yards on even-numbered days, while those whose house numbers end in an odd number may water on odd-numbered days, said Oklahoma City Water Utilities Trust spokeswoman Debbie Ragan.<\/p>

The program also includes hefty fines ranging from $202 to $612 for violations.<\/p><\/blockquote>

Ragan told the paper that, since May, almost 700 citations have been issued and more than 1,000 customers contacted about the conservation program.<\/p>\n

“We’ve always promoted water conservation,” she said, “but this year we’ve really ramped it up.”<\/p><\/blockquote>

But State Sen. Jerry Ellis, D-Valliant, a staunch opponent of OKC’s move to pipe water from Sardis Lake, is like many others who are against the plan: Hopeful, but skeptical as well:<\/p>\n

“They may be for real,” Ellis said. “Hopefully they have finally realized that the cheapest water is found with conservation. Then from there, they can look at other things.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

One of the biggest complaints StateImpact has heard from residents in Canton and southeast Oklahoma: Oklahoma City should conserve the water it has before taking it from them.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":42,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[491,16],"tags":[531,364,163,427],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17465"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/42"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=17465"}],"version-history":[{"count":21,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17465\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":17487,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17465\/revisions\/17487"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=17465"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=17465"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=17465"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}