Following the driest first three months in California's recorded history, on May 24, 2022, the State Water Resources Control Board adopted emergency regulations to expand water conservation actions across the state.
The statewide regulations ban watering of ornamental turf at commercial, industrial, and institutional properties. Although the mandate applies to non-functional turf at HOAs as well as some grass areas at institutional and commercial buildings, it does not affect irrigation of individual residential homes, watering of trees, or watering of grass used for recreational and/or other community purposes.
In addition to the watering ban of non-functional turf, the regulations require all California water suppliers to implement conservation actions under Level 2 of their Water Shortage Contingency Plans. At this time, SBMWD is implementing Stage 3 of the Department's Water Shortage Contingency Plan, where customers may continue to water outdoors for up to three days per week and fifteen minutes per station per day on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays before 8:00 a.m. and after 6:00 p.m.
On April 26, 2022, California’s largest water supplier, the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California, recently approved the implementation of unprecedented water use restrictions that limit customer irrigation to one day per week. These actions do not apply to customers of the San Bernardino Municipal Water Department.