Downtown LA is lush and green, pools are filled, lawns are watered. California cities get water, rural areas don't. Water use in LA actually increased in May 2014 vs May 2013-NPR

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7/20/14, "Despite California's Drought, Taps Still Flowing In LA County," NPR Staff and Sam H. Sanders, via wdyi fm

"This January, after the driest calendar year in California history, Gov. Jerry Brown declared a drought emergency. He called on residents to reduce their water intake by 20 percent. 

But downtown Los Angeles doesn't look like a city devastated by the state's worst drought in decades. The city is green with landscaping, and fountains are running. People still water their lawns, wash their cars and fill their pools. 

Earlier this week, Gov. Brown announced that, compared to last year, water use this May actually went up in some parts of the state — including in coastal Southern California, the region including LA, where water use rose 8 percent. The state has responded by voting to fine water-wasters up to $500....

And if some people don't feel a sense of urgency about the drought, there might be a reason for that. Peterson points out that since Gov. Brown announced the drought emergency, water agencies across the state have been emphasizing that they had enough water to last them through the year. 

"In January, when the governor said, 'We're going to have a drought,' [the agencies] said, 'Oh, don't worry, we've got this covered, we've got water in our reserves,'" (Molly) Peterson (an environment correspondent at member station KPCC) says.

The numbers on residential water use might also be misleading. "We only even have part of the data to tell us about the 8 percent going up," Peterson says, "because we only have voluntary responses." This week, the state released new rules to address the drought, including for data collection.

"[The water agencies are] going to have to start coughing up their data about how much water they're actually getting through the tap every month," Peterson says....

Peterson says it's also important to remember that the consequences of the drought are hitting some residents much harder than others. 

"California is a very, very diverse state economically, and so you have haves and have-nots," she says. 

"Cities are generally haves," Peterson says. "Even though there are poor people within them, the cities keep the water on."

"Have-nots, for water, are in El Dorado County," a rural area east of Sacramento: "They're taking bucket showers." 

Rural residents tend to rely on wells, some of which have dried up. Friday, the federal government announced $9.7 million in emergency drought aid for those areas."


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