Top Ten Worst?

[02roadking]

http://green.yahoo.com/blog/the_conscious_consumer/110/cities-with-best-and-worst-tap-water.html

Cities with the worst water:

1 Pensacola, FL
2 Riverside, CA
3 Las Vegas, NV
4 Riverside County, CA
5 Reno, NV
6 Houston, TX
7 Omaha, NE
8 North Las Vegas, NV
9 San Diego, CA
10 Jacksonville, FL

[Ocklawaha]

Hee Hee! They really think so eh? Man I can show you wells in Oklahoma so full of oil that they're POISON. Out in California's Sierra Nevada we have hot springs, Volcanic, where the carbon monoxide is so dense the trees die in higher elevations. Mono Lake is arsenic with water, while others in the desert are choked with salt and boron. Yeah buddy, just bring your dipper and pick your poison. Having a cabin in the Mojave quickly teaches you, if you CAN drink it, it's GOOD WATER!

OCKLAWAHA

[kellypope]

Ok, so what can we actively do to stop polluting our water? I'm not talking about rallying any politicians, that has such potential for failure. What actions do we have at our expenditure, what are our resources as common citizens to solve this problem?

[fsu813]

I had a long conversation with someone who works in the water business, big water business, a few months ago.

He runs water plants around the South, from Texas to FL and so on.

He said that water regulation in Florida is like the wild west, in which you can get away with all sorts of stuff with little consequence. He painted the people responsible for regulating it as inept and out-of-touch.

When asked about how Jax's water is, he said that it was actually pretty good compared most other areas.

His warning was that our lauded Aquaphor is rapidly being contamtinated with sea water. As fresh water is sucked out, sea water fills in. So the larger cities near the coast are having a problem with contamination......thus they have to go further into the Aquaphor. Obviously that story doesn't end well.

[Dog Walker]

The salt intrusion problem is worst in the Tampa Bay area.  Between population growth and the phosphate mines that use millions of gallons of water per DAY, all of the near coast well fields have gone saline.  Tampa has actually put in a desalinization plant to treat their well water so that it can be used.

Our state has has been drawing on a finite natural resource to fuel development as if it were infinite.  You think your water/sewer bill is high now?  Just wait a few years and watch it go up by an order of magnitude.  It's going to be time for backyard cisterns again.

[sandyshoes]

backyard cisterns - good idea, but somebody like a Mayor Peyton will surely figure out how to tax the %#$@ out of that! 

[kellypope]

My mom and I went to Lowe's a couple of months ago and they had a sale on rain barrels. We bought three, but I think we'll need 9 for when those heavy summer rains make three rivers at three points of our roof. Not quite a cistern, but 9 barrels is a lot of water.

fsu, how do we stop being so inept? How do we get more in-touch?

[Dog Walker]

Did you know that the situation regarding water regulation has gotten worse in Florida?  Wild, wild west before is nothing.

Governor Crist has removed the authority of the Boards of the Water Management Districts.  Very occasionally these Boards would deny a permit from someone who wanted to withdraw water from the aquifer or the rivers.  Even this was too much for the developers and the water industry, so they got Crist to direct that the Executive Director of each Water Management District has SOLE authority to issue of deny permits.  The Boards are now merely advisory.

Since the Directors are appointed by the Governor, and the Governor is in the pocket of the development interests; what do you think is going to happen?

Completely disgusting and totally negates the whole purpose of establishing the Districts in the first place.

[Ocklawaha]

Yucca Valley  â€" Water-free urinals are the latest trend in water conservation and a recent addition to some public facilities in Yucca Valley. In a recent partnership with the Town of Yucca Valley and the Hi-Desert Water District, there are water-free urinals now at the California Welcome Center, the Community Center, the Town of Yucca Valley Public Works Department facilities and at the Hi-Desert Water District facilities.

Just one more desert rat concept from California. Water at the cabin is delivered by truck and everyone has huge "service station" size tanks buried in the yard. Water levels are measured with a long dipstick, and orders placed accordingly. Every drop of waste water from sinks, tubs, and washers, is cycled into the garden or gray water tank. Rain (HA! yeah, about twice a year) is caught from roofs and channeled into barrels for use as utility water. The only thing shipped out is the black water which goes into a typical septic tank, and hence into a fairly shallow drain field with some very hardy plants on top. Usually the plantings are cacti or poison plants, otherwise the Jackrabbits will eat EVERYTHING! To completely wash your hands of the St. Johns, PLEASE use waterless hand cleaner.

It's not easy, but when one see's the Mojave or Owens River, then compares them to the old photos... Well... Maybe Florida needs a lesson?

OCKLAWAHA

[sandyshoes]

To completely wash your hands of the St. Johns, PLEASE use waterless hand cleaner.
/quote]

Whoa, hold on there, Buckaroo - I'm hoping you didn't mean that literally, as there are some forms of fecal bacteria which will only be conquered by soap and warm water;  look up clostridium difficile, called "c. diff" for short.

[Cricket]

To completely wash your hands of the St. Johns, PLEASE use waterless hand cleaner.
/quote]

Whoa, hold on there, Buckaroo - I'm hoping you didn't mean that literally, as there are some forms of fecal bacteria which will only be conquered by soap and warm water;  look up clostridium difficile, called "c. diff" for short.

Think you may have a point there, Sandy. I have always been a little paranoid about the 1% disclaimer on those sanitizer bottles. 1% is still a whole lot in the world of bacteriology.

[Ocklawaha]

Sorry Sandy, but the "shit" is on your toothbrush too! When toilet's flush microscopic particles sail into the air, landing throughout your home. Frankly, a lab swipe will probably show it in your hair, coffee cup and driveway.

Just go for a second rinse with the cleaners, in the desert we have no other option. The cabins sit atop veins of gold and silver, but the water is more valuable.

OCKLAWAHA

[kellypope]

Ock, your post makes me think of this collaborative project between a group called SimpArch and the Center for Land Use Interpretation. (http://www.simparch.org/cleanlivin.html) They worked on an abandoned WWII military base in the desert of Utah, having to bring in their own water by bicycle, creating soil by removing the layer of salt on top and then adding compost and plant matter, as well as utilizing the soil-creating-and-water-saving composting toilet.

Again, I ask if anyone has any suggestions for means a citizen has to feel empowered here. Our government, if you like to call it that, is not taking care of the situation as they should. So what can WE do?

How about we stop buying bottled water? Boycott. Zephyrhills (Nestlé), and I'm sure Coke, are daily pumping hundreds of thousands of gallons of our fresh water out of the state, not paying anywhere near what they should for it, and selling it back to us. Anyone else object to that? Let's not forget what all that plastic does to, uh, the planet.

[fsu813]

"fsu, how do we stop being so inept? How do we get more in-touch?"

- Don't ask me. I was just conveying what I was told.

Get more reluctant politicians in office isntead of aspiring politicans probably.

[Cricket]

Sorry Sandy, but the "shit" is on your toothbrush too! When toilet's flush microscopic particles sail into the air, landing throughout your home. Frankly, a lab swipe will probably show it in your hair, coffee cup and driveway.


OCKLAWAHA

One reason you should always close the lid before you flush and leave your brush soaking in alcohol overnight.
How come the squatting Japs don't have a problem with their water? Beats me.