It’s California. The got what they voted for.
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The Santa Ynez Reservoir, which holds drinking water for Pacific Palisades, was empty during the 2025 Palisades fire and is now dry again, concerning nearby residents.
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A $19.5-million project to replace the floating cover is needed to ensure the quality of the drinking water, but will keep the reservoir out of service till fall.
The Los Angeles reservoir that was notoriously empty during the 2025 Palisades fire has been drained once again as crews replace its floating cover, to the dismay of area residents who worry that there won’t be water available to fight wildfires.
The Santa Ynez Reservoir stores drinking water for Pacific Palisades, and the $19.5-million project to replace its damaged cover is needed to ensure the water is safe to drink, according to the Department of Water and Power.
But with warm weather and wildfire season ahead, community leaders would prefer to see a full reservoir even if the water isn’t suitable for drinking.
“It’s a failure to recognize that there is value to this community to have the reservoir full,” said Maryam Zar, head of the Palisades Recovery Coalition. “It’s incredible to me that after the experience we went through [with the Palisades fire] there is still no recognition that this reservoir should be filled to the gills, whether or not it’s potable.”
The DWP announced the cover replacement project in January, saying the 15-year-old cover is damaged and needs to be replaced to comply with state and federal water quality regulations. The project is expected to be completed and the reservoir returned to service this fall.
DWP Chief Operating Officer Anselmo Collins said city officials would ensure aerial firefighting water sources remain available, including from the Encino and Stone Canyon open-air reservoirs.
Collins said the cover, which spans roughly 10 acres, is to ensure safe, reliable drinking water and to maintain the facility while the department considers long-term options to replace the floating cover method.
“We recognize the cover is not in the best shape possible,” he said, calling the replacement project a short to midterm fix.
In 2024, the reservoir was drained for repairs to the cover, but construction hadn’t started before the Palisades fire kicked off. After it was repaired in April 2025, remaining pinhole tears caused by embers from the fire meant the reservoir had to be drained again, Collins said.
He said that he understood the community’s concerns, but that the DWP is adding six miles of water piping from another facility as a backup measure to ensure there is enough water to serve the Palisades for drinking water and emergencies.
Because the cover must be built on top of an empty reservoir, Collins said the reservoir needs to be drained during construction.
The Palisades fire started Jan. 7, 2025, destroying nearly 7,000 structures and causing 12 fatalities. Firefighters lost water pressure from hydrants high in the hills, frustrating their efforts to combat the blaze.
The 2025 fire was set by a leftwing terrorist, but that being said, wild fires are a yearly thing in California. They can be contained if the resources are managed properly. Dems always manage to make a bad situation worse.
This is the rank incompetence and stupidity that caused the current hellscape.
24 DEAD. $135-$150 billion in damage. 10,000 homes and businesses destroyed.
But no water.
Instead of cleaning the forest floors, removing dead trees, capturing rain runoff, and making sure California has water in the hydrants, Dems deflect and blame “climate change”.
Gavin Newsom cut more than $100 million from California’s fire budgets. Instead, he spent it on things like tranny cafes, ‘social justice’ art, gay choirs, illegals, and the NAACP. There is no water in the reservoirs because California’s leftist regime returned it to the ocean, to ‘save a fish’, which hasn’t been seen in over a decade.
BTW: $100 million raised for Los Angeles fire victims was funneled to over 188 NGOs, many unrelated to the fire, including a musicians’ charity and an NGO whose whole entire job is to raise money for other NGOs.
As California homeowners watch their lives go up in flames, they may want to pause a moment and credit the assclowns in their own state and local governments for creating obstacles to wildfire prevention.
Related posts:
https://sfcmac.com/more-wild-fires-in-california-thanks-to-dem-policies/