Who Owns The Rain? In Utah, Not You!

1. Simon
   November 12th, 2008 at 2:26 am

   A similar situation is beginning to take effect here in Australia too. At least at the local council level. If you have a rain water tank, and rely solely on the weather for water, you still have to pay a fee to the water management people. (Western Water in Melbourne are charging Gisborne residents who have never, ever been connected to a mains supply).

2. jonno
   November 12th, 2008 at 5:39 am

   Ok, that is just madness, next it'll be if you have a wind turbine or solar panels it will be necessary to pay the electric company a fee because its not fair to generate your own power!!?

3. Ray
   November 12th, 2008 at 6:25 am

   And here in Ontario they want to charge us in rural areas for well water. If you refuse to put a meter on your well, they just make a guess and add it to your property tax.
   Excuse me, I have to go and change the filter on my air-meter, my breathing's getting difficult.

4. Robolasse
   November 12th, 2008 at 6:26 am

   "Damn you Cohagen! You got what you wanted, now give these people air!"

5. Scotchdrnkr
   November 12th, 2008 at 7:21 am

   Here in St. Louis The sewer company charges you for storm water run off. If in this case the storm sewer company is charging them for the run off then it should be considered the car companies water and the can do what they want with it.

   To Ray in Ontario
   The reason they want to charge you for the well water is because its the only way they can figure out how much water you are putting in their sewer system. If you are on septic then they shouldn't be allowed to charge you.

6. Rocky Rook
   November 12th, 2008 at 7:31 am

   Watching that was really frustrating. I guess that is part if the price one pays for living in the city (or state or country).

7. ted
   November 12th, 2008 at 8:07 am

   If you're in the country, you're not putting water into the sewer system. You're putting water into a septic system, which you then pay someone else to clean out.

8. Craig
   November 12th, 2008 at 10:28 am

   This is the same story in Washington state. First it was for people in semi-arid 2/3rds of the state, where rainfall is about 15" per year. People found collecting rainwater from their downspouts are fined. Insane! But it turns out to be true in Seattle as well - and we get 45" per year. You can collect a barrel full, but you cannot collect larger amounts - like a cistern. The city likes to sell you the water you use, thank you very much.

9. Janet
   November 12th, 2008 at 10:43 am

   This is disgusting, so much for helping the earth.

10. johan
    November 12th, 2008 at 11:47 am

    There are two understandable reasons to do this.

    1) which has already been mentioned, is to estimate the effect on sewers. I guess seattle doesn't want all that grey water added to their santizing load, if you get the idea to flush your toilets with it.

    2) is ground-water. I believe colorado allows to you halt rain water, but only if you eventually use it for irrigation, so that it makes it back to the groundwater.

    The colorado system seems much more reasonable. Go ahead and store the rain-water all you want, but it must be used for irrigation, and can't be dumped into the sewer.

    Of course, here in Mass, all our rainwater run-off goes into the municipal sewer anyways, so I guess it doesn't matter.

11. Scooter
    November 12th, 2008 at 11:53 am

    As far as i'm concerned if the rain is falling on my property I own it. I don't rake my leaves out of my neighbors yard. Those leaves belong to him now.

12. kahili
    November 12th, 2008 at 12:06 pm

    that reporter sounds like, and even looks a little like, kent brockman from the simpsons.

13. SD
    November 12th, 2008 at 12:31 pm

    This is sick. Absolute religious sickness.

14. stapler
    November 12th, 2008 at 1:53 pm

    So did that guy just basically say it's ok for the 'little fish' to break the law, but not the 'big fish'? What is gray water? How could the big fish harm anyone?

15. DOJ
    November 12th, 2008 at 5:53 pm

    so is there a reason you can't meter your water intake and sewer output separately?

16. Matt Blank
    November 12th, 2008 at 11:38 pm

    I live in Utah and we have some really weird Irrigation laws. All of these problems stem from the fact that we live in the middle of a desert and people insist on having things like lawns and raising cattle. Because of this, we've developed a large variety of strange and stringent irrigation laws. My grandmother lives in an older part of town (Salt Lake City) that has open irrigation channels in it. She diverted some of the running water for her large garden and when the public works people noticed a drop in the volume somewhere downstream, she was fined. Apparently she didn't have water rights even though it was flowing through her back yard. Fun times in Utah...

17. Neener
    November 13th, 2008 at 4:38 pm

    well if your jurisdiction has water rights and you don't own them, then you can't very well use that water then. Pretty simple. I own the water rights to my property, so I can do as I please. My uncle sold the natural gas rights under his farm, so he no longer has any rights to that even on his own property (because the natural gas is no longer his property). If this is simply an issue of buying the water rights, as expensive as they may be, then it's really no issue, is it?

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