The state's monthly water-use report card due Tuesday will provide a look at how more than 400 local water agencies are doing when it comes to water conservation efforts across drought-stricken California.
The state is entering a fourth year of drought with no signs of improvement during what is typically the state's wettest season. Storms and heavy rainfall in December brought hopes for relief from the drought, but they were dashed by an unseasonably dry January and plummeting snowpack in the Sierra Nevada Mountains.
The monthly water-use report will provide a look at residential per capita water use in December compared with the year before.
The State Water Resources Control Board began collecting and publicizing the water-use numbers as part of its ongoing conservation campaign. The board imposed restrictions on watering lawns and washing cars last summer after Gov. Jerry Brown declared a drought emergency for the state in January 2014.
Brown asked residents to reduce water use by 20 percent, a goal that has been difficult to achieve. The closest Californians came to reaching that goal was in August, when water use dropped 11.6 percent compared with the previous year, according to the monthly surveys of water suppliers.
Dry conditions are still looming. Downtown San Francisco had no measurable rain in January for the first time in recorded history. A snow survey last week found the snowpack in the Sierra Nevada mountains, which supply about a third of California's water, contained 12 percent of the normal water expected.
Springtime water runoff from melting snow in the Sierra range provides water for an estimated 25 million Californians.
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The water board's mandatory water restrictions are set to expire in April. The board is also considering extending and expanding those rules later this month.
