Summer quickly approaches. This is the time of year that the community begins to use more water, so I thought of sharing some of the proactive steps and innovative approaches we’ve taken in just the last six months to safeguard your water quality.

1. Calibrated dosing for chlorination (customer experience) – While our mission is to deliver safe, reliable water, we also believe our customers appreciate good-tasting water. Our primary treatment agent is chlorine and, while the chlorine levels in the water have always been maintained well within state regulations, we’ve had several neighborhoods where customers for a number of years have noticed a stronger chlorine taste. Recently we reimagined a more optimized and hands-on approach to water treatment by installing more monitoring devices called chlorine analyzers and taking more active chlorine level reads to further calibrate chlorine dosing. We also installed a device called a peristaltic pump, which feeds chlorine at a steadier rate. We’ve received much positive feedback from the community on this. Thank you for your input!
2. Water hardness (customer experience) – Similarly, while water naturally has high “water hardness” on the West Coast, customers have provided input about the scaling happening with household appliances. We are actively looking into implementing a solution designed to mitigate the higher water hardness that occurs in our water supply.
3. PFAS/PFOA (proactive and innovative water quality management) – You’ve likely heard in the news PFAS, a collective term for a group of man-made chemicals manufactured and used in various industries worldwide for more than 70 years. If so, you’ve heard of what research shows as alarming health impacts. The state maintains the nation’s highest regulatory standards in terms of PFAS levels in the water (four parts per trillion), and the District ensures that our water is well within those standards. However, we believe that we should do what we can to remove outright these contaminants from the water. To that end, the District pursued and secured funding for a pilot project for the most effective and cost-efficient method of removing PFAS and we are moving closer to a future where, at least in our community, it won’t be present in our drinking water.
4. Optimized operations (cost savings) – The District sends up to 1,500 water quality samples annually to laboratories that provide independent testing and forward those results to state regulators. We recently optimized the routes for those samples. We then considered laboratory alternatives and made a few transitions. Finally, we are embarking on a “water production balance optimization model” that will optimize when and how water is moved through our 96 miles of pipeline, which directly impacts energy usage, one of our largest cost drivers. All of these efforts are geared toward cost savings that can be reinvested into the system or mitigate future rates.

I want to give particular thanks to our new-ish System Operations and Telemetry Manager Gabriel Gomez III for his leadership in tackling this broad range of issues and opportunities. 

President of the CVWD board of directors Jeffery Johnson shared, “While I have lived in La Crescenta for over 30 years, I have served on the CVWD board for just the last three years. What has impressed me about the folks who manage the District is that they are not only committed to tackling the big systemic problems facing us, like reduced water supply, aging pipelines and microplastics and contaminants like PFAS, but they are also dedicated to addressing the quality of the water at the tap, like taste and hardness issues, that impacted various neighborhoods in the District.”  

I am grateful for our board’s leadership in setting policy priorities that go the extra mile. 

I’m also pleased to announce our new Customer Onboarding Program. This is a welcome program open to new and existing customers. One of the District’s customer service representatives will schedule a complimentary service visit to show you how to read your water meter, locate shut-off valves for emergency preparedness, connect you to WaterSmart, which allows you to track your usage and detect leaks immediately to avoid any high bills. Just another way for your community’s water and wastewater provider to provide an added layer of value to you and your families. 

Thank you to Arminé Sargsyan, Water Resources and External Affairs specialist, and Adam Sutphin, Senior Management Analyst, for developing this benefit for our customers.

In closing, there has been significant outreach from the District and broad coverage here in the CVW regarding our proposed rate structure changes and rate increases. We held several town halls last week, and a lot of good questions came up during after those events. We’ve provided responses for all of those questions on our website, and you can review them at https://www.cvwd.com/rates. Perhaps we’ll see some of you at our public hearing on June 10 at 6 p.m. at La Crescenta Elementary School, 4343 La Crescenta Ave.

Thank you as always for taking the time to read and for continuing the dialogue.

James Lee, General Manager
CVWD