Roseville restricts lawn watering to Mondays and Fridays

Roseville will restrict residential lawn watering to Mondays and Fridays, prohibit hardscape watering and forbid new turf grass landscaping in response to the drought, city officials said Friday.

The state this month ordered Roseville and other California cities to cut water consumption by levels ranging from 4 percent to 36 percent between June and February, depending on how much each community used per person during the same period two years ago. Roseville must cut usage by 28 percent compared to 2013 levels.

The city’s customers reduced use by 18 percent last year, state figures show. Rich Plecker, the city’s director of environmental utilities, said the new restrictions should provide enough savings to hit the mandated target.

“I’m pretty optimistic it will work,” he said. “We were at about 26 percent (reduction) last month before any of these changes.”

Roseville has not restricted lawn watering to particular days in the past. Nonetheless, its residents use less water per capita than most other communities in the four-county area, state figures show.

Among the new restrictions:

▪ Water waste is prohibited.

▪ Washing hardscape is prohibited, unless for health and safety concerns.

▪ New or expanded landscape is limited to drought-tolerant trees, shrubs and ground cover irrigated on a drip irrigation system.

▪ Fountains, ponds and decorative pools must be drained (unless ponds contain fish).

▪ Covers are required for all new pools and spas.

▪ Low-volume drip irrigation systems that irrigate at less than 2 gallons per hour are exempt from day-of-week watering restrictions.

Several other cities, including Sacramento, limit lawn watering to two days per week. Earlier this month, West Sacramento became the first city in the area to limit watering to one day per week, a rule that took effect Friday.

About 128,000 people live in Roseville, the third-largest city in the region.

This story was originally published May 15, 2015 at 9:32 AM with the headline "Roseville restricts lawn watering to Mondays and Fridays."