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Water district: intertie with Santa Cruz, new wells, WaterSmart meters and drought status
Summary
The Scotts Valley Water District described a state‑funded intertie project with the City of Santa Cruz, a new high‑capacity well, meter modernization and a significant decline in leak-related water use since WaterSmart enrollments.
The Scotts Valley Water District presentation described multiple infrastructure projects intended to improve reliability and aquifer sustainability, including an intertie with the City of Santa Cruz, new well drilling, meter modernization and stormwater capture projects.
The district said it secured a roughly $9.5 million state grant to fund an intertie (described in the meeting as EnerTie/intertie) that will allow transfers of surface and groundwater with Santa Cruz; construction includes a pump station site on Sims Road and a pipeline segment already installed. The intertie was described as capable of moving roughly 1.5 million gallons in either direction and is intended to let the district use surface supplies when available and reduce well pumping in wet years.
District staff said a new well on Scotts Valley Drive is capped at about 600 gallons per minute and a separate Susenta well will produce about 325 gpm once final controls are calibrated. The district reported total withdrawals of about 975 acre‑feet last year — the smallest annual withdrawal since 1985 — and noted the Santa Margarita groundwater agency allocation caps the district at about 1,300 acre‑feet per year under its groundwater sustainability plan.
The district highlighted a system-wide meter modernization and customer engagement platform (WaterSmart). Roughly 68% of customers had signed up for WaterSmart, which the district credited with an approximately 81% decline in leak-related billed volumes between 2019 and 2023 (from 6.7 million gallons of adjusted leak volume in 2019 to about 1.3 million in 2023). The district also described stormwater‑capture improvements at a municipal parking lot that increase infiltration and support recycled‑water irrigation used at parks and medians.
Why this matters: the intertie, new wells and improved leak detection increase supply resilience and affect how much additional housing the local water system can support. The district said that under current modeling, dense housing of the types now proposed would be feasible within the approved sustainable yield, but noted ongoing planning and agreement details with Santa Cruz remain to be finalized.
District staff invited residents to use rebate programs for turf replacement and pressure regulators and said construction of the intertie pump station was starting, with heavy work to follow.
