Re “Poor decisions on Lake Hodges risk disaster” (Oct. 6): The author mentions the movie “Chinatown” five times, but doesn’t note that the movie was about criminals victimizing the public, while the Hodges story is about reasonable decisions made by honest people. Qualified engineers declared the dam unsatisfactory. Their job was to evaluate the structure, not fire risk.
Let’s not conflate fire safety with water supply.
The county’s foreseeable water requirements will be well-satisfied without Hodges storage. Whether to rebuild the dam is insignificant to our water planning. The writer assumes that it is possible to redesign the system and install pumps to send Hodges water uphill to the County Water Authority’s aqueduct, store it in some other reservoir, purify it and add it to the well-managed supply. While the writer criticizes “high-priced” imported water, this water from Hodges would cost more than CWA’s current Imperial Irrigation District purchases.
We live in a desert, and we import water efficiently. There is no low-cost water.
— Ken Olson, Del Mar