Corpus Christi could see its Stage 3 water restrictions lifted as early as next week, City Manager Peter Zanoni announced, marking a significant shift in the city's water outlook after more than 18 months of some of the strictest conservation measures in recent memory.
Zanoni said the city expects to move back to Stage 2 water restrictions soon — possibly as early as this weekend.
"We expect to get into Stage 2 soon... beginning maybe this weekend maybe next week," Zanoni said.
The city entered Stage 3 water restrictions on December 16, 2024, which prohibited residents from watering their lawns. A return to Stage 2 would allow residents to water once every other week on their designated trash pickup day.
"In Stage 2 what we can do is water once every other week. All our community wants to do is water their lawns. This will certainly help us get to that," Zanoni said.
Zanoni can declare the move to Stage 2 once the city's reservoirs exceed 30% of combined capacity.
In more good news for the city, the projected timeline for a Level 1 Water Emergency has been pushed back to September 2028. Earlier this year, that date had been set for September 2026.
"The first date we gave in April was September of '26. That's real. That's when we were heading for what could've been a catastrophic event," Zanoni said.
A Level 1 Water Emergency would require residents, businesses, and industry to cut water usage by 25%. That was going to be a challenge for everyone.
The new September 2028 projection does not yet account for water expected to flow into Lake Corpus Christi starting this weekend, meaning the timeline could be pushed even further out.
As lake levels are expected to rise, city staff is also working to temporarily halt the agreed order with the state that requires the city to release water for environmental reasons. Zanoni said the city has already met with the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality about a four-month temporary reprieve.
"We've already met with TCEQ and it would be a temporary reprieve for four months. What they can see is this drought of record we're getting out of it's been years since we've done any releases. You can draw conclusions on impacts we haven't seen any significant ones," Zanoni said.
All of these updates will be discussed at Tuesday's City Council meeting.
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