Even After Heavy Rainfall, Conservation Is Key, Water Authority Analyst Says

If you feel like it's been an unusually wet few months this year, you're right.

Now that the month of February is in the books, NBC7 Meteorologist Jodi Kodesh said, San Diego is well above its average rainfall for the rain season, which starts October 1.

San Diego hasn't had an ongoing rainfall average this impressive in over a decade.

Kodesh said that San Diego measured 11.62 inches of rain from October 1 through the last day of February. Normal rainfall for that time period is 7.36 inches, meaning San Diego is 4.26 inches above average.

This is good news for California and San Diego, according to Jeff Stephenson, the Principal Water Resources Specialist for the San Diego County Water Authority.

“The state can be in a drought condition, but we really aren’t in a drought condition,” Stephenson said.

One of the reasons the San Diego County Water Authority has declared the San Diego region out of the drought is because San Diego has diversified its water supplies.

“We have the desalination plant, recycled water, and imported water from the Colorado River and some from Northern California,” he said.

According to Stephenson, most of San Diego County’s 24 reservoirs are about half full right now. Three of them are close to capacity, and the rest are typically used for imported water.

Despite the record-breaking rainfall, he said it’s still important to conserve.