THE majority of Bathurst residents have gotten the message about conserving water, but there are still a few people who think it's okay to flout the rules.
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Bathurst Regional Council's director of Engineering Services, Darren Sturgiss, has given an update on the city's water security with new information from May, including details of compliance with water restrictions.
The city remains on level four water restrictions, which came into effect on October 14, 2019.
Since then, council has received 350 complaints. Thirteen of these were raised last month and are being actioned.
If a breach is identified, council in the first instance will send out a courtesy letter informing the individual or household that they need to improve their behaviour.
To date, 211 of these letters have been sent and, in his update, Mr Sturgiss said there were seven new cases requiring letters to be sent.
In situations where people continue to flout the rules, or extreme circumstances, council will issue fines.
Mr Sturgiss said one new fine was issued in May, bringing the total to four.
Council does not release information regarding the circumstances that led to someone being fined.
Mayor Bobby Bourke said he was pleased with the level of compliance so far.
"The community has really taken it on board," he said.
"There is one [new] fine and I know of people that are being warned and that's what I'd like to see, people warned.
"But, if they continue after those warnings, they need to be fined. Some of these people are being warned up to twice and I think that's enough.
"If you get warned and then warned again, you deserve a fine."
Mr Sturgiss' report also highlighted that water consumption remains lower than council had anticipated it would be.
Demand on the town water supply continues to average 9.5 megalitres per day.
"This is an excellent result for the Bathurst community. Residential consumption for the last month has averaged 133 litres per person per day, which is well below the 2014 Drought Management Plan expectations of 183 litres per person per day for level four; this consumption is well below level five (159) and almost at level six (129) requirements," Mr Sturgiss said.
Cr Bourke said it's great to see consumption so low and encouraged residents to keep up the good work.
"Continue to do the great job you're doing on water consumption. It will help and it has helped," he said.
"I hope I can relieve some of that pressure by getting some of these [water security] projects up and running before the end of the year."
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