Paso to dip into water fund reserves

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• Letters to the Editor 10/3

  Letters to the Editor 10/3

  A pivotal role

  As a high school senior, I’ve had at least 20 different high school teachers during the past four years. Some teachers I’ve grown to love, and some teachers I’ve grown to loathe. However, I am absolutely certain of one thing: High school teachers are underappreciated.

  Someone who believes that teachers only work from seven in the morning to three in the afternoon needs to have his or her mind adjusted. Teachers have lessons to plan, papers to grade and students to baby-sit. Teachers aren’t paid overtime for all of the effort they put into the classroom outside of school.

• Suits over Paso water rates go in different directions

  Suits over Paso water rates go in different directions

  A second citizen lawsuit filed in June against Paso Robles’ water-rate increases has been thrown out, even as another lawsuit against the city that’s been on hold for about two years might finally go forward.

  In the June lawsuit, John Borst of Paso Robles again argued that the city’s water rate increases to pay for its portion of the Nacimiento Water Project should have been considered a special tax requiring voter approval, instead of going forward as a fee on a water bill.

  The case was essentially the same lawsuit Borst filed in May 2010 — with four other members of a Paso Robles-based citizens group — that San Luis Obispo Superior Court Judge Martin Tangemen ruled against in October.

• Lake water follows rocky path to Paso

  Lake water follows rocky path to Paso

  My hometown, Paso Robles, is like an unlucky Monopoly player. It wants to buy the Water Works, but it keeps getting “Chance” cards that say, “Go back three spaces.”

  But last week, our City Council did move one space forward. It approved the construction of a limited, seasonal, water treatment plant. That plant could take five years to build, but it would let us finally drink some of that Nacimiento Lake water we’re paying for but can’t use.

  In 2004, the council contracted to buy 4,000 acre-feet of water per year from the proposed Nacimiento pipeline. That pipeline is now built and is carrying water right through Paso Robles.

• Paso ghosts chime in on water rates

  Paso ghosts chime in on water rates

  Two ghosts haunt the Paso Robles Library/City Hall building. They are the spirits of Ignacy Jan Paderewski and a 9-foot-tall California grizzly bear.

  Paderewski was a classical piano superstar in the late 1800s and early 1900s. He became a part-time Paso Robles resident after the local hot springs and mud baths cured the pains in his overworked arms and hands in 1914.

  The grizzly bear was seen in the 1770s easing his arthritic rear paws in the main Paso Robles hot spring.

• Nipomo revs up pipeline efforts

  Nipomo revs up pipeline efforts

  EDITOR'S NOTE: This story has been updated to include links for information on the water-shortage publicity campaign and opposition to the Santa Maria water pipeline project.

  Every day, when residents on the Nipomo Mesa fill up their coffee pots, irrigate their lawns or take a shower, they’re using water that comes from under their feet.

  Nipomo residents rely on water from an enormous underground aquifer that covers a surface area of about 256 square miles and serves parts of southern San Luis Obispo and northern Santa Barbara counties.