The new campaign, to be launched this summer, will build on the water-saving momentum Metropolitan has created over the last three years through its award-winning conservation campaign and rebate programs.
Metropolitan board Chairman Randy Record commented:
“These efforts have produced results. Our research shows attitudes toward conservation have changed, awareness has increased. But we still have work to do.”
The upcoming campaign will introduce new marketing strategies to promote the many water conservation rebate programs offered by Metropolitan and its member agencies.
During California’s recent record dry period, residents and business owners across the region demonstrated an impressive commitment to conservation. However, since last year’s record precipitation, 2018 has seen a rise in water use as dry conditions have returned.
Metropolitan General Manager Jeffrey Kightlinger said the new campaign would remind Southern Californians the need for conservation isn’t based solely on the weather, it was a permanent lifestyle change everyone needs to make every day.
“In the past few years, we’ve seen dramatic swings in hydrologic conditions, from the driest to the wettest periods in California’s recorded history,” Kightlinger said. “Those kinds of swings aren’t likely to end. Climate change will only add greater uncertainty and more challenges. Some of that is out of our control, but what is within our control is how much water we each use on a daily basis.”
For the first time since 2015, the upcoming multimedia campaign will include television advertising, allowing the conservation message to reach many Southern Californians in their homes, where sustainable behavioural changes need to happen. The campaign will also connect with audiences through radio and streaming radio, community newspapers, billboards and busses and social media.
Like its predecessors, the new campaign will include multilingual messaging to reach diverse audiences, a top priority for Metropolitan’s board.
The Metropolitan Water District of Southern California is a state-established cooperative of 26 cities and water agencies serving nearly 19 million people in six counties – Los Angeles, Orange, Riverside, San Bernardino, San Diego and Ventura.
The district imports water from the Colorado River and Northern California to supplement local supplies, and helps its members to develop increased water conservation, recycling, storage and other resource-management programs.
The largest distributor of treated drinking water in the United States, Metropolitan currently delivers an average of 1.7 billion gallons of water per day to a 5,200-square-mile service area.
Metropolitan owns and operates an extensive range of capital facilities including the Colorado River Aqueduct, 16 hydroelectric facilities, nine reservoirs, nearly 1,000 miles of large-scale pipes and five water treatment plants. Four of the treatment plants are among the 10 largest plants in the world.