SMMUSD HDQRTRS — Like everybody else in the city, school district officials are working to keep water usage down in the midst of this historic drought.
The district's water usage increased slightly last school year as it did the school year prior.
The Santa Monica-Malibu Unified School District used 51.6 million gallons of water in the 2013-14 school year compared to 50.9 million in 2012-13 and 49.2 million in 2011-12.
In presenting water reduction measures to the Board of Education, district officials warned against reading too heavily into the data. They pointed out that they've yet to establish specific baselines regarding water usage.
One recommendation from district officials is that the board spends some bond measure money analyzing how much water is used inside the schools versus on irrigation.
At the school level, there aren't many unifying trends surrounding water usage. A few schools, like Lincoln Middle School, show a steady increase in usage over the past three years and others, like Malibu High School, show a steady decline, but many of the schools' water usage bounces up and down from year to year.
Some of Malibu High School's water reduction success can likely be attributed to a new filtration system in the pool.
Previously, the pool filter was backwashing water into the storm drains and out into the ocean — a practice that is not allowed, district officials said. About 421,200 gallons of wastewater was created through this process annually. Now, only 6,500 gallons of water is backwashed each year, district officials said. That water is kept in holding tanks and hauled out on trucks.
Other water-saving techniques have included a districtwide overhaul of landscaping.
"We've pretty much eliminated the use of grass, which requires a lot of volume in our projects," said Stuart Sam, director of facilities improvement. "We've really reduced it by planting a lot of shrubs."
Irrigation systems are now feeding right into the roots whenever possible to reduce water lost through evaporation, he said.
Sam also noted the new fields, with synthetic turf rather than grass.
Boardmember Oscar de la Torre asked district officials to look into the safety of synthetic fields because he'd read that they can be harmful.
Will Rogers Elementary School has added a water refill station for kids and teachers who bring water bottles to school.
Schools have used rain barrels, provided by City Hall to collect irrigation water during storms.
District officials asked board members to consider sustainability when approving building upgrades.
"Sustainability is only as good as the facilities that we have and our facilities are very outdated," said Virginia Hyatt, who runs purchasing for the district. "A lot of our systems, our mechanical systems, just don't work and function efficiently anymore and in order for us to be sustainable we really need to start replacing a lot of those mechanical systems and other systems within the district, the irrigation and those types of things."
Boardmember Richard Tahvildaran-Jesswein suggested that district officials look to young people when considering sustainability. He noted that students are enthusiastically leading the charge against the use of plastic bottled water.
