Residents of about 2,900 households hooked up to the Eldorado Area Water and Sanitation District face a summer of uncertainty about when they will be able to use water outdoors more than one day a week.

The district on May 25 imposed its most severe water-use restrictions for the second time in the 40 months since the public utility took over the private water system that subdivision developers built.

"When we bought our place, they told us there was a 100-year supply of water. Now we are on a Stage 2 water alert," said Robert Johnson, who moved to Eldorado from Texas two months ago.

The district board of directors maintains it has plenty of water but can't pump it fast enough from existing wells to replenish its tanks. In a permit application to use a new well drilled under an exploratory permit, the district argued it has rights to pump water from that well. Staff at the Office of State Engineer disagreed.

The question of Eldorado's water rights is one of several disagreements, both procedural and substantive, blocking movement toward a decision on the district's permit application for Well 17.

District officials say the new well and other proposed wells are necessary to meet surges in demand for water, while maintaining adequate storage in tanks for emergencies such as system failures or fires. State water-office staff disagree the need is so immediate.

The State Engineer's Water Rights Division has asked a hearing examiner to reject the district's latest effort to move the hearings ahead. The division says the district had not complied with requests for digitized ground-water modeling data to support the permit application.

The district then provided a version of the reports, but as digital facsimiles of printed pages, which are virtually useless for computer modeling, according to the state water-office staff.

In a document asking that the permit hearing be moved ahead, the water district said the state water-office staff was "splitting hairs" with its request for useful computer modeling data. Last week, board President Jim Jenkins told about 20 district customers who crowded a bimonthly meeting the board was "absolutely dedicated to trying to get as much information as we can to each and every person."

When residents asked why they first found out about the extent of water-use restrictions in a newspaper, Jenkins said complete notices outlining the water emergency were not included in a May mailing, even though he had drafted a letter and intended to send it.

Longtime resident Don Dayton last week said the community was better off when the district was more closely regulated by the Public Regulation Commission. When a private company owned the system, Dayton said, the company at least had to file monthly operational reports with the state, which were then available to the public.

Meanwhile, a decision from the PRC on the district's request for an average 30 percent rate hike could be several weeks away. Testimony in that case ended May 30.

The district last week was also awaiting a decision on its second emergency application for a temporary permit to use the idle Well 17.

Contact David Collins at 986-3064 or dcollins@sfnewmexican.com.