Yuba City Homeowner Fined $250 As City Cracks Down On Water Usage
YUBA CITY (CBS13) — A Yuba City homeowner the city says has repeatedly broken the new water-saving rules has been fined $250.
The fine is the largest its city code allows. The city says the homeowner was repeatedly caught watering more than the required two days a week.
"It's significant, but it's not like this person hasn't been contacted. We've contacted them multiple times," said city spokesman Darin Gale.
The state wants Yuba City to cut water use by 32 percent, so the city is stepping up education and enforcement, fining water wasters who ignore warnings like never before.
"We have to give some type of penalty to get them into compliance," Gale said.
The city has already handed out triple the number of $50 fines for repeat offenders this year than it did in the final months last year. It's also fined eight customers $100—something it didn't do at all last year.
Former Yuba City Mayor Rory Ramirez isn't so sure the fines will lead to conservation.
"The going out and placing fines and having people driving around videotaping at 2 o'clock in the morning to me is an approach we might want to re-think. Enforcement is difficult," he said.
Statewide numbers show water districts hesitant to make people pay up for wasting water. According to the State Water Resources Control Board, 8,762 warnings were issued in March, compared to just 682 fines.
That could soon change with districts trying to meet new mandatory cutbacks.