Proposed Water Rate Increase_ Restrictions-Feedback Public Comment from Mary Beth ToupinHello,
I am sending an email here to give my residential input to the necessary metered water pricing increases. I am late getting my reply over, but hopefully not too late to have this
input received.
We all know that the increases are necessary as exponential demands will not be declining.
With this statement, I recommend that our City of Kalispell consider the process of implementing secondary irrigation to new developments that are being built. Instead of potable
water being used for lawn irrigation, agricultural, and even residential use, secondary treated water is instead implemented. Secondary treated is not potable water, but instead reserved
for irrigation use.
Just because we live in the Northern Rockies, we are not without drought and absolutely not without residential influx causing demands. If not already consulted: States like Utah,
Nevada, Arizona, and even Idaho have already implemented water restriction measures and metered secondary (irrigation) water that can be used for systematic referencing and better management.
The metered secondary water allows the monitoring of water usage and can detect when residents are watering on "off" days. Most secondary meters are a simple Satellite detected puck
that sits on top of the in ground valve box, completely eliminating the need of a physical meter read. Managing water usage will also help the inevitable reduction of pressure when
everyone is watering at the same time.
Water consumption will always be an issue, but it's not too late to develop the community's expansion in a smarter direction moving forward in order to prepare for the continued developments
of farm lands being turned into our expanding and growing cities.
Lastly, additional great resources are already available to help the smart watering of anything, but still need the cities to motivate the use via rebates ect. Both Rainbird as well
as Orbit offer some of the best smart home watering products on the market, with many others in competition.
I hope that you will find this email helpful and consider consultation with some of our southern industrious states and how they manage their residences water consumption before it
becomes unmanagable here in Montana.
Sincerely,
Your Kalispell Resident
Mary Beth Toupin