Almaden Resident

News

Water district candidates debate customer rates, budget practices

By Monica Heger

For an agency with a $300 million budget, the Santa Clara Valley Water District makes few headlines. Rosemary Kamei and Ram Singh, candidates for director of District 1, which includes most of Almaden Valley, are attempting to change that.

The two candidates faced off Oct. 11 during a debate at Gunderson High School.

Kamei, who has been on the board since 1993, highlighted her record and the changes to the district that she's overseen.

Kamei said the district has greatly increased its education programs and has added internships since she joined the board. She said the district has become more environmentally conscious.

Singh, who is a professor of water resources engineering at San Jose State University, said he is running because he believes the water district is poorly managed and that board members do not understand the issues.

He cited his knowledge of water resources engineering as a great advantage he could bring to the board. None of the current board members are engineers.

"Money has been wasted on the wrong projects and the wrong design," Singh said.

He said he could reduce the district's budget from $300 million to $150 million, which would mean lower rates for consumers.

Kamei said it was impossible to promise lower rates for consumers because of the many factors that were involved in determining rates. She said in the last eight years, she had never voted for a rate increase. She said since the water district is a wholesaler, even if it were to lower its rates, that would not necessarily translate into lower rates for consumers because the retailers may not lower their rates.

She also defended the water district's budget.

"We were reviewed by the grand jury, and they said the district is a well-run organization," Kamei said.

There are seven members on the water district board: Two at-large members are appointed by the county board of supervisors; five are elected from the geographical areas that coincide with the county's supervisorial districts.

The water district is responsible for the stewardship of five watersheds, including 10 reservoirs, and more than 800 miles of streams and groundwater basins. It annually provides just under 400,000 acre-feet of water to its 13 retailers. Each acre-foot is the equivalent of 358,600 gallons of water, or enough to fill a football field a foot deep.

For more information on the water district visit www.valleywater.org. For more information on the candidates visit www.ramsingh.org and www.voterosemarykamei.com.