Santa Clara Valley water district mulls hiring ‘water cops’
A San Francisco Bay Area water district is set to vote on the hiring of “water cops” to issue fines to people caught wasting water.
The Santa Clara Valley Water District board must decide Tuesday whether to spend $500,000 to hire up to 10 temporary workers to help enforce new state rules on water conservation.
The San Jose Mercury News reports that if approved, the workers would respond in person to complaints about wasteful outdoor watering.
Last week California water regulators approved fines of up to $500 a day for water wasters after a survey showed that a statewide call to cut water use by 20 percent failed.
The three-year drought is the worst in California since the mid-1970s.
