The cities within our watershed address are collaborating on water conservation through two major partnerships. The Saving Water Partnership is a consortium of 18 water utilities implementing the 1% water conservation initiative. Beginning in the year 2000, the consortium set a goal to reduce personal and business water consumption by 1% every year for 10 years. Of each person in business in the region could become 10% more efficient and using water over 10 years. It will save approximately 14.5 million gallons of drinking water per day. The partnership estimated that this amount of water would meet the needs of the population growth within King County. The Cascade Water Alliance is made up of these partners. Water conservation is critical to the Alliance supply management strategy. In 2010, their conservation program saved and estimated 346,000 gallons of water per day, or approximately 1% of the Alliance members combined average daily demand. Here are a few examples of how this actually happens. In 2010, Cascade Water Alliance provided rebates to homeowners for the installation of 5,518 high efficiency toilets, bearing the EPA water sense label. Cascade Water Alliance gave away 2,389 rebates for high efficiency closed washers. A majority of retailers report that they now sell mostly these types of machines and not the popular brands that are less efficient. On the commercial side, the heat wave during the summer of 2009 led to higher than expected water bills. For many businesses, especially those with major landscape or agricultural irrigation needs. At the same time, the downturn in the economy encouraged many irrigation contractors to pursue retrofitting irrigation systems, since there were fewer opportunities for new installations. These conditions led to an unprecedented interest in irrigation system retrofits in 2010. 23 projects were completed.