LIVE OAK >> The pipes are in, the filters are primed and the water is almost ready to flow at the Soquel Creek Water District’s Pure Water Soquel facility in Live Oak.

Although the faucets won’t be turned on until early next year, the new facility’s nearly three-year construction effort was capped off Thursday at a ribbon cutting ceremony hosted by district officials and featuring keynote addresses from a slough of regional, state and federal dignitaries.A decade in the making, the roughly $180 million facility is an integral part of the district’s effort to bring the Santa Cruz Mid-County Groundwater Basin—the sole freshwater resource for its 40,600 customers—into sustainability by 2040.

“It’s been an incredible, unforgettable, daunting, intimidating, amazing, nerve-racking, breathtaking, exhilarating and totally awesome 10 years,” said newly-appointed Soquel Creek Water General Manager Melanie Mow Schumacher.

The state-mandated sustainability goal came after years of drought that contributed to chronic overdrafting of the basin, meaning water was drawn out of it faster than it could be naturally replenished. Without a buffer created by the subterranean lake of freshwater, seawater from the coast began to creep into the basin and threatened to spoil the critical resource which would carry catastrophic consequences along with it.

Because calling the cavalry, in the form of imported water, was never an option, the Pure Water Soquel project is the district’s answer to the intractable overdraft problem and it is grounded in water reclamation and recycling.

“We were facing and existential crisis in this basin within this district,” said Supervisor Zach Friend, who represents much of the district on the county Board of Supervisor and is himself a Soquel Creek customer. “You’ve rewritten the future for water security and safety here in Santa Cruz County, and it’s a model for the country.”

The new facility is designed to take in 1.3 million gallons of daily water from the neighboring Santa Cruz Wastewater Treatment Facility via an 8 mile underground pipeline that runs through Santa Cruz, Live Oak and Capitola. After it is received, the water is sent through an intensive five step purification process at the Live Oak facility before it is run through additional piping and injected into three intrusion prevention wells in Soquel that are designed to combat the creeping seawater.

Still, the 1.3 million gallons piped over to Live Oak are only a fraction of the 8 million gallons the Santa Cruz wastewater plant treats everyday, most of which ends up getting thrown back into the ocean. That is why the facility and pipe system was constructed with expansion capacity that makes it capable of eventually receiving as much as 2.6 million gallons per day.

The district’s latest addition, sitting on the corner of Soquel and Chanticleer avenues, does hold a hefty pricetag, but was made possible by a variety of state and federal grants and low-interest loans. The California State Water Resources Control Board contributed $87 million in grants and low-interest loans while the federal government, through the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation, provided the local agency with a $30 million grant last September carved out from the 2021 Bipartisan Infrastructure Law.

“I’m just proud that the federal government actually did something; actually played it’s role when it comes to this global project,” said Rep. Jimmy Panetta, who represents the Mid County region in Congress. “I’m proud because all of the partners underestand our responsibility of being a part of this community.”

The celebratory event featured a who’s who of speakers coming from all levels of government that, in addition to Friend and Panetta, included state assemblymembers Gail Pellerin and Dawn Addis, state Sen. John Laird, Santa Cruz Mayor Fred Keeley, former district general manager Ron Duncan and current Board President Bruce Jaffe, as well as public officials from the Bureau of Reclamation, Environmental Protection Agency and the California State Water Resources Control Board.

After the green ribbon had been cut, marking the end of construction and the beginning of a state and federal review process that will hold off water processing until March, event attendees released 100 Painted Ladies butterflies from tiny white boxes into the afternoon sun in what organizers said was a symbol of transformation and renewal.

Still, the event was held while the county was engulfed in a relentless and prolonged heatwave that was a sobering reminder of the extreme conditions that helped necessitate the project in the first place.

“We are still facing an unprecedented water crisis and there are predictions that global freshwater demand is going to exceed supply by 40% by 2030,” said Mae Wu, deputy assistant administrator at the EPA. “2030 sounds like the future, but it is not that far away at all.”