ITEM:		DISCUSSION ITEM
14.	UPDATE ON WATER DEMAND BY JURISDICTION
Meeting Date:			November 13, 2023	Budgeted:	No
From:			David J. Stoldt	Program/
			General Manager	Line Item No.:	N/A
Prepared By:			David J. Stoldt	Cost Estimate:	N/A
General Counsel Approval: N/A
Committee Recommendation: N/A
CEQA Compliance: This action does not constitute a project as defined by the California Environmental Quality Act Guidelines section 15378.

SUMMARY: The District adopted a Supply and Demand forecast at its September 19, 2022 Board meeting. The forecast was based on the 25-year Association of Monterey Bay Area Governments’ (AMBAG) 2022 Regional Growth Forecast, a 25-year model that informs the AMBAG Metropolitan Transportation Plan and is intended to be consistent with the 6^th Cycle Regional Housing Needs Allocation (RHNA). The Adopted forecast showed an incremental need of 944 acre-feet (AF) of new supply to meet demand.

While the AMBAG documents purport consistency between the 6^th Cycle RHNA Plan 2023-2031, the Metropolitan Transportation Plan, and the Regional Growth Forecast (see Exhibit 14-A highlighted sections), upon review of the AMBAG documents District staff discovered some disconnect between RHNA housing numbers and Regional Growth Forecast population numbers. Such inconsistencies are shown below:

Jurisdiction	6^th Cycle RHNA Units Required (2023) by AMBAG	25-Year Population Growth in AMBAG MTP and Regional Growth Forecast 2020-2045
Carmel	349	35
Del Rey Oaks	184	988
Monterey	3,654	1,469
Pacific Grove	1,125	552
Sand City	260	813
Seaside	616	4,779

Further, the County – while not yet completing its 2023-2031 Draft Housing Element – has preliminarily indicated that it will attempt to locate as many as 1,966 housing units within the District’s jurisdiction, almost 1,200 of which would be along the Route 68 corridor. Jurisdictions’ draft 2023-2031 Housing Elements consistent with the 6^th Cycle RHNA are due to be submitted to the State by December, however it is now expected that the County will be late.

While the District typically relies on population rather than housing (“people use water, not houses”) for its adopted residential water demand forecast, water demand based on proposed housing stock yields slightly different outcomes. Therefore, staff also analyzed the proposed RHNA housing units by capacity for water use, mix of stock per income class, water service provided outside the District and Cal-Am, among other things, as shown in Exhibit 14-B.

It may be instructive to look at other assumptions that might change based on the differences between the RHNA target and the AMBAG Regional Growth Forecast population.[1] District Staff presented preliminary analysis to the Water Demand Committee on October 2, 2023. Staff also made certain assumptions about non-residential water use as a result of job growth. Two different residential water demand forecast outcomes, added to the non-residential water demand forecast, will be discussed at the November 13, 2023 Board meeting, and are shown in Exhibit 14-C.

To this forecast, the separate needs of the Airport District and the Department of Defense installations must be added. Additional information on those additions is presented in Agenda Item 15.

EXHIBITS

14-A Excerpts of AMBAG Documents 2022 and 2023

14-B Summary of Water Supply Requirements for Housing

14-C Water Required for RHNA Units / Combined Water Demand Forecast

U:\staff\Boardpacket\2023\20231113\Discussion Items\14\Item-14.docx

---

[1] Note: Jurisdictions that believe they will accomplish their housing buildout much earlier than the 25-year horizon of the AMBAG Regional Growth Forecast have not adequately answered the questions as to how that affects population growth forecasts, what happens to population after the housing is built, is there a mis-match between housing and people, etc?