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Some restrictions lifted, but once-a-week lawn watering remains

Tribune file photo by KEVIN HOWE

Residents will need to hand-water a little longer after Swiftmud decided to maintain its once-a-week sprinkling restriction for homeowners.

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By NEIL JOHNSON | The Tampa Tribune
and JENNIFER LEIGH | News Channel 8

Published: July 28, 2009

Updated: 07/28/2009 01:41 pm

BARTOW - Residents in the Tampa Bay area can wash cars at home, pressure clean their own houses and switch decorative fountains back on starting Aug. 1.

But they still can't water lawns more than once a week.

The Southwest Florida Water Management District board agreed today to lift some of the state's most severe restrictions imposed on residents of Hillsborough, Pinellas and Pasco counties, mainly because water savings did not merit the work of enforcing them

But board members remained unconvinced that summer rains are ample enough to let residents return to watering their lawns two times a week.

They will ponder that at their meeting in August.

Michael Molligan, district spokesman, said the delay was done "in an abundance of caution."

The board's decision means residents can wash cars at home rather than only at commercial car washes that recycle water but only once a week.

Homeowners can also do their own pressure cleaning instead of hiring professionals who use less water than do-it-yourself jobs. However, pressure cleaning can only be done to prepare for painting, maintain paint warranty or for health and safety reasons such as cleaning algae from a sidewalk.

Pressure cleaning to meet homeowner association regulations for appearance is not allowed, except by a professional.

Homeowners and businesses can also turn on decorative fountains for four hours a day. Decorative backyard and indoor fountains may run eight hours a day.

Another change will allow buildings with water-cooled air-conditioning systems to set thermostats below 78 degrees.

The decision by the district's governing board to not loosen sprinkling restrictions mainly hinged on whether members believed the summer rain pattern has become established.

Lingering drought conditions forced the district to impose the state's tightest water use rules for cities and counties that receive water from the region's utility, Tampa Bay Water.

Those include Hillsborough, Pinellas and Pasco counties, plus St. Petersburg, Tampa and New Port Richey.

Last month, the board put off lifting the restrictions until today to see whether rainfall was sufficient to replenish the aquifer and rivers that supply nearly all the drinking water for the three counties.

But the afternoon thunderstorms expect to start in early June have taken off much of the summer.

Forecasters believe the summer rain pattern will set up Thursday but cannot say how long the pattern will last.

That's not to say rain hasn't been plentiful. It just hasn't been sparked by the typical collision of sea breezes from both coasts that meet near the Interstate 75 corridor and spread inland and toward the coast through the afternoon and evening.

Instead, rains have come from areas of low and high pressure that bring moisture and storms mainly from the Gulf of Mexico inland.

While the aquifer has rebounded since June, lake levels remain low, and rivers are running at normal levels but falling at a time they should be rising or maintaining their flow.

"We just don't want to make a big change right now and then suddenly go into a dry spell in the middle of the summer when it's driest – we don't get any rainfall – and we suddenly have to yo-yo back and forth with restrictions," Molligan said.

Rainfall measured at nearly 40 locations in the Tampa Bay area operated by the water management district show that rain so far in July and 2009 is close to or slightly above normal.

These scattered rainfall stations provide a wider view of regional rainfall than the single official reading of the National Weather Service at Tampa International Airport.

Water management staff members also believe the weather service rain measurements are not reflective of actual rainfall over the region.

The water management stations show that so far in July, Pinellas and Hillsborough have received about 90 percent of their normal rainfall, and Pasco has received 108 percent.

So far in 2009, Pasco has received 103 percent of its normal rainfall and Hillsborough 105 percent, the district's stations show. Rain in Pinellas this year is lagging at 83 percent of normal readings.

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