Elected officials and other dignitaries joined Santa Margarita Water District officials on October 10 to celebrate a new system that will fill Lake Mission Viejo with advanced purified water - saving more than 114 million gallons of drinking water annually.

"In the last three years, as the current drought has intensified, the question of the lake-fill water, the use of drinking water for that purpose, has taken on new, critical importance," SMWD Board President Charley Wilson told the more than 50 people in attendance. "It was last year, when the District, our constituent cities, and all of our customers became intently focused on the demands of the drought that this simple, but profound idea of taking our already highly-treated recycled water and providing an extra level of treatment to meet the lake fill requirements, brought all these partners together to find and effect a change that would benefit all the parties."

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