Backlash arose as Grover Beach city council members Zach Zimmerman, Karyn Bright and Daniel Rushing voted to increase water rates to help fund the Central Coast Blue Project. This project will recycle used water and pump it back into the underground wells in order to replenish the groundwater for generations to come. While the council members certainly aren’t happy with the potential recall of the three city council members, they are understanding of the concerns of the city members and hope to demonstrate to the community the positives of the Central Coast Blue Project.
“I absolutely hear the concerns with the price tag and it’s astronomical, but I just hope that everyone understands that city staff and council are working very hard; we’ve applied for additional grants, we are scrutinizing other measures that we can use to soften the blow as far as rates go,” Zimmerman stated.
The city council was split on the vote to raise the water taxes in order to fund the project, demonstrating division of thought within the council and well representation of all community members. While the decision wasn’t agreed on by all of the city council members, overall the council thought it would appeal to most people within Grover Beach.
“We had people coming to the council all the time saying we can’t conserve any more, we conserve as much as we can. You need to do something because we just can’t keep maintaining these water restrictions,” stated Bright.
Over the past few years the Central Coast area, and the entire state of California, have seen a significant drought until the rain that occurred last winter, causing concern for water among the community members.
“Two years ago, December of ‘22, [the water] was within a few feet, surface level wise, [and it wasn’t] able to provide water to the people who expected it downstream. The groundwater basin that we rely on, has shown sea level intrusion back in the early 2000s. And so those are two enormous red flags,” Zimmerman said.
These “red flags” have concerned scientists for years and extensive amounts of research have been done to plan and make decisions for the Central Coast Blue Project.
“A lot of smart people have been looking at the water options here and of all different occupations, politically, financially, all of that,” Zimmerman said. ”A lot of science has gone into what to do because here we don’t have state water,” .
The council members feel that many community members lack correct information in regards to pricing and what the project will actually accomplish for the community. It was apparent that many were using incorrect information when the petition to recall the three city council members was brought up.
“The first bullet point for the recall petition for me, says that I voted to increase our water rates by $1,000 a year. On the average water bill, we’ll see about a $13 a month increase or about $100 a year, not $1000,” Bright said.
Other statements within the recall petition stated that streets that had recently been repaired were going to be damaged, contradicting information on the actual project plans.
“Only two of our four hundred and fifty blocks will be impacted,” Bright stated.
Other members feel there is a lack of true information being used to form opinions about the project.
“I feel disappointed in the lack of civic discourse,” Zimmerman said. “ I think that we’re not all using the same information to form opinions.”
Even though he feels false information was shared in regards to the project, council member Zimmerman still put his best efforts into attempting to hear the community’s concerns.
“Before the meeting [I went to] go and talk to every business that I could contact with the [protest signs for the Central Coast Blue Project] and have conversations with people and, you know, see what, why they were feeling the way that they were and I think that was really illuminating for me,” Zimmerman stated.
The council members aim to help as many people as they can while still doing what is best for the community. Since most of the council members are parents, workers, and small business owners, they understand the potential toll that the increase would cause to some community members.
“At the end of the day, it’s not a large corporation that’s going to get rich off of this thing,” Zimmerman said.”It’s a city who’s going to be able to maintain their lives in clean water for generations.”
Compared to other cities on the Central Coast, and even with the increase of the water rates, Grover Beach still has some of the lowest water rates in the area. To help remediate the costs of the project, council members are working diligently to access more resources to help curve the cost for the water rates.
“The overall cost of this project is 93 million. We’ll repeat this portion is 33.4 8 million. We [the City of Grover Beach] received grants to date. That puts our personnel at 16.7 million, and we have another 10.8 million grant in the pipeline. So when we receive grant funds, they will of course be put towards the project which would require less of an increase to support the project,” Bright said.
The council members are actively working to reduce the amount of impact the project will have on water rates, through applying for grants and other funding. The projected rates also may not remain as high. The current projected rate for the 2024 year is around $120 bi-monthly, making it still the lowest projected water rate in SLO County. In the year 2028 the Grover Beach water rates are projected to be the sixth lowest in the county, according to the “Expired Rates Study”.
“The water rates through the water study are a worst case scenario,” Bright said.
While the rates of the water are going to increase, the people behind the decision are just concerned community members. They too will have to endure the increase in rates and aren’t going to become rich off the increase, but just hope to improve the city of Grover Beach.
“My intention is to support our community and move it forward in a nuanced and comprehensive fact based way,” Zimmerman said. “Do the greatest amount of good for the greatest amount of people type of thing.”
The true information regarding the Central Coast Blue project can be found on the city’s website and the Central Coast Blue Projects website.
