TPWD Observes Water Awareness Month

05/01/11 - Twentynine Palms

In coordination with the California Water Awareness Campaign, the Twentynine Palms Water District will be observing the month of May 2011 as "Water Awareness Month".

In preparation for this observance, the District worked to promote public awareness about the vital role of water and the importance of its conservation and protection.

Helpful tips were included in each water bill and distributed to approximately 8,000 meter services throughout the previous year and a brochure (Adobe PDF) was made available at the District's customer service desk highlighting water conservation and protection ideas. 

In addition, the District offered all 4th, 5th and 6th grade educators in Twentynine Palms the opportunity to have a representative provide a presentation to their students about their local water supply and the importance of water conservation and protection. As a result, the District conducted 7 water education presentations.

Along with this program, the District also sponsored a poster contest which was open to all 4th, 5th and 6th grade students in the area.

The 1st Place winner received a $50 US Savings Bond and the 2nd and 3rd Place winners received a $25 US Savings Bond, all of which were kindly sponsored by the Morongo Basin Conservation Association.

Presentation of the awards was made at the beginning of the District's Board of Directors meeting held Wednesday, April 27th at the District offices.

Winners of the contest were from Oasis Elementary school and are listed as follows:

1st  - Cheryl, Mrs. Pacheco's 5th Grade Class

2nd - Neil, Mrs. Pacheco's 5th Grade Class

3rd - Sharon, Mrs. Pacheco's 5th Grade Class

The winning entries can be viewed on the District's website and will be displayed in the office lobby beginning in May.

Chief Touts Measure to Boost
Fire Protection Tax

02/08/12 - The Desert Trail
By Kurt Schauppner 


TWENTYNINE PALMS — Fire Chief Jim Thompson recently used a group photo of Twentynine Palms firefighters to describe the effect of failure of a measure aimed at increasing property tax funding for the Fire Department.

"Take that picture, tear it in half." he said, addressing members of the Twentynine Palms Kiwanis Club at their breakfast meeting on Tuesday, Feb. 7.

Thompson will spend the next few weeks visiting Twentynine Palms service organizations in an effort to sell a plan to increase the tax local property owners pay for fire and medical emergency protection.  That tour will likely include a community meeting, sometime in March.

Measure H, if approved in a special mail-in election in the spring, would increase that tax from $80 to $120 per unit, beginning on July 1, 2013.  It would also allow for a $6 annual tax increase for 10 years following 2013.

Approval of Measure H would also see creation of a five-member Volunteer Citizens Oversight Committee to keep an eye on how the Fire Department spends its extra income.

Ballots will be mailed out to voters in the Twentynine Palms Water District, which oversees operation of the Fire Department, in mid-March.  They are due back at the Registrar of Voters office by Tuesday, April 17.

Speaking of the effect of a defeat of Measure H, which needs approval of 2/3 of votes cast, Thompson implied one effect would be closure of the Lear Avenue fire station, which serves Desert Heights, Indian Cove and much of the western portion of Twentynine Palms. 

"You can make that assumption, the board has not made decisions," he said.  "The whole community could see an increase to their property insurance," he said.  "You are going to end up with inadequate response times."

He noted that property tax revenues have not covered expenses at the Fire Department.  "This year we are going to take $195,000 out of our fund balance," he said.

TPWD Shows Off Treatment Plant

08/09/06 - The Desert Trail
By Kelly O'Sullivan

TWENTYNINE PALMS - It rushes from the tap - clear and clean whenever we want it - and that's all most of us care about when it comes to water.  Not Mike Wright.  Twentynine Palms Water District's general manager is responsible for providing water on a daily basis to 17,000 thirsty residents in an 87-square-mile area that includes Twentynine Palms, Indian Cove and Desert Heights.

Wright and his staff also must look to the future to ensure that the water keeps flowing since the district gets its water from a finite source - four underground aquifers.

On Tuesday, Aug. 8, Wright showed off the district's pride and joy - the $4.2 million Fluoride Removal Plant at Utah Trail and Amboy Road.

The plant's mechanical parts were assembled by TPWD personnel under the guidance of its designer, Frederick Rubel of Tucson-based Rubel Engineering.

Had TPWD hired outside contractors for that work, the facility - the only one of its kind, which draws water officials from as far away as Egypt interested in building their own treatment plants - would have cost taxpayers $7 million, Wright said. District officials did hire a contractor to lay the floors, put up the walls and roof the building, he said. The plant went into operation on March 12, 2003.

Through the plant, which can treat up to 3 million gallons of water per day from TPWD's Mesquite Springs aquifer, the district pumps 1 million gallons of water a day, five days a week, into its pipeline system.

Five million gallons a week may not sound like a big deal in a water system that delivers an average of 2.8 million gallons of water a day to customers - 5.08 million gallons a day in the peak summer months - until Wright tells you those 5 million gallons from the Mesquite Springs aquifer have allowed the district to dramatically offset growing demands on two of the district's other three aquifers.

Water levels in the district's Fortynine Palms Canyon aquifer were dropping at a rate of 6 to 10 feet a year and levels in its Eastern aquifer were falling 4 to 6 feet a year, Wright said. Today, they're dropping at a rate of 1 to 2 feet a year.

The Indian Cove aquifer continues to fall at a rate of 4 feet a year because the district doesn't pump water from the Mesquite Springs aquifer that far west in the system, Wright said. A reservoir project now under way is expected to lessen the demand on the Indian Cove aquifer by 50 percent by the end of 2007.

Taking out the fluoride Water in the Mesquite Springs aquifer has a naturally high fluoride content, so the district must remove the fluoride from that water before delivering it to customers.

The state currently allows most water districts a maximum of 2.0 milligrams of fluoride per liter but because of the high fluoride that naturally occurs in the water here, TPWD was granted a variance allowing 3.0 milligrams per liter.

Water from the Mesquite Springs aquifer comes out of the ground with between 5 and 7 milligrams of fluoride for liter and leaves the plant at less than 2.0 milligrams per liter.

When the plant is operating, 2,100 gallons of water a minute flow into the facility, pumped from a well just south of the building.

“Every drop of (that) water goes into the (pipeline) system,” Wright said.

The water level under the facility is at 58 feet below ground. The well is 1,050 feet deep and the water is pumped from 440 feet, Wright said.

Not all of the water pumped into the facility requires treatment, he noted.

Computers monitor the flow and water that doesn't require treatment - about 23 percent of that 2,100 gallons per minute - is diverted into a bypass pipe that runs into a 250,000-gallon reservoir just east of the building. From there it goes into the pipeline system, on its way to customers.

Treating the water from the Mesquite Springs aquifer is a four-step process. In a nutshell, the water flows through a series of pipes and into one of six huge blue treatment vessels. The water's pH level is decreased to 5.5, which allows for the removal of the fluoride. Once the fluoride's removed, the water's pH is readjusted to 8, then the treated water goes into the reservoir and into the pipeline system.

Once a week, TPWD takes one of its six treatment vessels offline to remove the fluoride built up in that vessel, a process called regeneration.

During regeneration, the waste stream from the treatment vessel is directed to a wastewater reservoir on the west side of the plant. Water-saturated fluoride from the reservoir is pumped into an accordion-like machine called a J-press, which squeezes the water from the fluoride.

That water is used to irrigate 50,000 saltbush plants planted by hand around the treatment facility. Wright said the plants absorb all of the wastewater so none seeps back into the water table.

The dried fluoride, which is classified as non-hazardous waste, is discarded in the county landfill.

The whole eight-hour process of treating the water, and regenerating treatment vessels, is conducted at night to maximize energy efficiency, Wright said.

Completely computerized, it requires only one employee to be on site to monitor the operation.

EPA Grants $1.8 Million to TPWD

08/04/05 - The Desert Trail

TWENTYNINE PALMS - The Twentynine Palms Water District will soon begin benefiting from almost $1.8 million in grants from the Environmental Protection Agency.

That money will be combined with $2.3 million in local matching funds to pay for $4 million in improvements to the water district's infrastructure.

Improvements will include construction of a million-gallon water storage reservoir and support booster pump station south of Sullivan Road and a two-million gallon water storage reservoir south of Samarkand Drive. 

They will also include booster pump stations adjacent to Twentynine Palms Highway and Two Mile Road and about 43,000 linear feet of 12-inch diameter pipeline along existing road and pipeline right of way.

"These water infrastructure improvements will provide for storage and distribution of drinking water, thereby ensuring adequate water supplies within the Twentynine Palms service area," said Alexis Strauss, director of the Water Division in the EPA's Pacific Southwest Regional Office in San Francisco.

Twentynine Palms Water District General Manager Mike Wright said Monday morning that the district began applying for the grants in 2001, when Tina Johnson was still in charge.

"Tina Johnson began the process. I just happen to be the lucky guy at the end of it," he said.

The process was due to come to fruition with the awarding of the grants on Tuesday.

"Jerry Lewis had a lot to do with getting us this," Wright said of the area's longtime congressman.