Skip to main content

California City Tackles Budget Shortfalls with Smart Water Management

Santa Clarita City saves 2.5 billion gallons of water with smart water management technology.

Located on the arid, northwestern edge of Los Angeles County, Santa Clarita is a notable example of a boomburb. It annexed a number of unincorporated areas, contributing to a large population increase. Santa Clarita grapples with budget shortfalls exacerbated by dwindling water supplies, rising water rates, and increasingly rigorous resource conservation requirements. Santa Clarita City leaders, highly regarded for their many successes in applying technology to address tough public works challenges, cracked the code by aligning financial, environmental, and regulatory goals in a single landscape water use efficiency program.

Even before California instituted mandatory water restrictions in 2015, Santa Clarita conducted a thorough review of Smart Water Management technologies. The City then set about retrofitting antiquated irrigation timers with Internet-­enabled WeatherTRAK smart irrigation systems for 700 acres of Landscape Maintenance Districts, including parks, medians, and streetscapes. Automated smart controllers equipped with a global percentage decrease capability enabled the City to efficiently meet the 25% mandatory cutback.

To assure the success of its program, Santa Clarita selected a highly experienced implementation partner, BrightView Landscaping. The City has already achieved immediate budget relief by reducing the cost of irrigating facilities by 25-to-40 percent. Since implementing smart water management technology, the City has cumulatively saved more than 2.5 billion gallons of water.

North Park Monument


Largest Single Deployment of Smart Irrigation in the U.S.

  • More than 700 smart controllers installed
  • Over 2.5 billion gallons of water saved over the last 8 years