Oviedo council agrees to citywide education push, weighs tiered reclaimed‑water rates to fund conservation grants

Oviedo council members on June 2 discussed a plan to reduce irrigation and stormwater impacts by combining education, an adopt‑a‑pond push and possible tiered reclaimed‑water rates that could fund a conservation grant program.

The discussion centered on data volunteers gathered showing that some homeowners associations (HOAs) and apartment complexes are irrigating far more than recommended, and on a proposal to use higher reclaimed‑water tiers to create a grant fund for pond revitalization and other water‑saving projects. No formal vote was taken; council members indicated they would convene an informational meeting for top users and interested residents as a near‑term next step.

The issue drew local resident Keegan Ford, who presented property‑level usage figures the volunteers compiled. Ford, who described Twin Rivers Community HOA as “averaging 820,000 gallons per month,” said the community put the equivalent of 5.6 inches of water per month on 5.2 acres of HOA‑owned land and noted a single‑month usage he described as a corrected figure of 338,000 gallons (he also cited larger monthly totals in his slides). Ford told the council that, by contrast, recommended total water (rainfall plus irrigation) for St. Augustine grass is about 4 to 6 inches per month and that many systems were not accounting for rainfall. He said, “There’s a lot of low hanging fruit here. There’s a lot of opportunity to drastically…