Because the Council recognized the potential value of combining related tasks and duties into areas of focus, we formed five workgroups from our membership. Formation of the workgroups provides a helpful focus on the issues and has the added benefit of achieving a voluntary division of labor based on individual member expertise and interest. Council members serve on as many workgroups as they wish, and many serve on more than one subgroup.
This workgroup is charged with exploring the possibilities of establishing and maintaining a statewide public awareness program and a public recognition program for water conservation. Development of an ongoing statewide, water conservation awareness program has the potential to strengthen existing local water conservation programs and boost public awareness in areas of the state that do not have local water conservation programs.
This workgroup is charged with exploring the creation of standard methodologies to be used as tools in the development of conservation targets and goals. Development of such tools would involve monitoring trends in water conservation implementation as well as monitoring target and goal guidelines for water conservation at the regional and entity levels.
This workgroup is charged with exploring the standards and methods to monitor the implementation of water conservation strategies that are included as goals in the regional water plans. Water conservation is a key component of the state Water Plan and all regional planning groups have been strongly encouraged to make conservation an important part of their plans. However success is measured by how the plan is implemented and by how much water is actually conserved.
This workgroup is charged with creating a process and procedure to monitor new technologies for possible inclusion in the BMPS guide. Additionally this workgroup is also charged with exploring the development of an online library system that would be interactive and facilitate storage and review of conservation resources. It would catalog and house information on public policy, BMPs, case studies, water use technologies, customer planning resources, and consumer tips.
This workgroup has the short term charge of conducting a study to evaluate the desirability of certifying water conservation training programs. No later than December 1 2008, this workgroup will be required to submit their findings of the study and present their recommendations in the legislative report. This particular task expires on June 1 2009.
With the conclusion of this workgroup’s original short term charge of conducting a study to evaluate the desirability of certifying water conservation training programs, the Council has elected to redirect the workgroup’s efforts. The workgroup will be exploring the correlation between energy and water conservation. In particular they will be looking into the potential opportunities to integrate energy and water planning, create cooperative efforts and support recommendations that address both energy and water conservation.