The so-called worldwide water crisis is being linked to current and future wars, disease and populations shifts.
In fact, today's Huffington Post reports on a study showing water shortages will impact 70 percent of U.S. counties by 2050.
But, back here in 2010, a different kind of water crisis has been playing out in Orange County.
For instance, there were the two 18-year-old guys busted last week for allegedly setting off water bombs at Irvine Spectrum Center.
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Now, the guys in Irvine–allegedly–were only messing with common chemicals mixed inside a water bottle. Anaheim cops had to deal Monday with a water jug filled with explosive powder and equipped with a fuse.
The 5-gallon water bottle bomb sat on a sidewalk in a neighborhood near Yorba Regional Park for hours before someone stumbled upon it and called police around 2:45 that afternoon.
It was so potentially lethal that folks had to be removed from the park and a dozen neighboring homes, and removal of it by the county sheriff's bomb squad unit caused traffic to be shut down on busy La Palma Avenue until 5 p.m.
Police say the jug, which was taped around the top, wound up containing a large amount of explosive powder–and its fuse had been lit. Fortunately, no explosion resulted.
The bomb squad wound up igniting a portion of the device near the park to render it harmless. It remains a mystery who made it or left it there.
Over in Garden Grove, city officials have no idea who is pulling two water-related scams.
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According to a message from the city Public Works Department, mostly elderly Garden Grovers are being sent letters from a fictional firm selling insurance for water-service lines for $4.95 a
month.
The city warning states:
Residents
recently reported receiving solicitations in the mail to purchase
insurance for their water service line. The letters appear to be
targeting elderly residents. This is not [city's emphasis]a notice issued by
the City of Garden Grove. The letter can be viewed on the City's
website at www.garden-grove.org.
Anyone who has
received this or a similar letter should contact the Garden Grove
Police Department's Investigations Division at (714) 741-5837.
In
an even more, as the city put it, “brazen fraud attempt,” a man identifying himself as a city
employee named Christopher told a resident the city water supply had been contaminated before entering the resident's home to perform “tests.”
“This
individual is not [city's emphasis] a City employee and his claim is false,” warns Public Works, which advises residents to ask for proper identification from anyone asking to come inside your home for any reason.
City vehicles are clearly designated as “Garden Grove,” employee uniforms are usually orange shirts with navy blue pants, and city workers wear name tags, Public Works reminds residents.
If further verification is needed from someone claiming to be a water department employee, call the Garden Grove Water Services Division at (714)
741-5395.
OC Weekly Editor-in-Chief Matt Coker has been engaging, enraging and entertaining readers of newspapers, magazines and websites for decades. He spent the first 13 years of his career in journalism at daily newspapers before “graduating” to OC Weekly in 1995 as the alternative newsweekly’s first calendar editor.