File Photo (Image Credit: CFJC Today)

By James Peters

B.C. Drought

City of Merritt enacts severe water restrictions

Aug 16, 2023 | 2:40 PM

MERRITT, B.C. — The City of Merritt is the latest B.C. community to enact strict water restrictions.

By moving to Level 5 Wednesday (Aug. 16), the city is prohibiting lawn watering or garden sprinklers. Flowers, trees and shrubs are not permitted to be watered, meaning only vegetable gardens and fruit trees can be watered using valved hoses or drip irrigation.

Outdoor washing is not permitted, with the exception of vehicle windows or by order of a regulatory body. Car wash business remain open.

Bulk water use, such as filling or topping up pools and hot tubs, is not allowed.

The strict rules are in place because of the severe drought conditions in the B.C. Interior. The city notes the Coldwater River, especially, “is in a crisis situation.”

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“As a ‘losing reach’ or ‘sinking river’ where incoming water drains into aquifers that supply the city, fish habitats are stressed to the level where the river may lose its ability to support the lives of fish and all the other animals that depend on that ecosystem,” says the city in a news release.