Irrigation Restrictions In Texas

As part of a renewed effort to cut water use, Austin may further restrict lawn watering and take a more aggressive approach to enforcement. According to a wide-ranging set of proposals presented recently to the City Council, Austin could extend its summer twice-a-week watering schedule year-round and limit irrigation to only parts of suburban-sized lots and business properties.

In an overall shift in philosophy, Austin would also begin making water-conservation steps mandatory instead of voluntary, according to a report summarizing the proposals.

The proposed measures, as well as aggressive conservation steps already under way or being planned, would cost the utility as much as $100 million in revenue, through both added expenses to carry out the program and reduced water use. To make up that shortfall, rates would increase between 18 percent and 24 percent over 10 years, according to the report.

The new water-conservation ideas were drafted after the council ordered the Austin Water Utility to figure out how to reduce the city's per-person water use to 140 gallons by 2020, a level of water consumption recommended in 2004 by the Texas Water Development Board — and a goal that San Antonio says it has already achieved. The new measures would come on top of a water-conservation plan the City Council adopted in 2007.