Something to fill your toilet

Don't you hate it when people forget to flush? Our Uber-mayor did that at a Michigan news conference testerday while launching his campaign to persuade other mayors to bring in water conservation programs.

Miller told the crowd that Toronto hadn't yet reached its 2011 target of a 15 per cent cut to water use, and that low-flush toilets would be the key.

Wrong.

To quote the Toronto Start article (July 14, 2007): "The city set out in 2003 to reduce average water use to 1.18 billion litres a day by 2011. Turns out the rate was down to 1.17 billion litres by the end of 2006. "We're doing awesome," said Georgopoulos."

The day before the Star reported Pamela Georgopoulos, a manager of the city’s water program, as saying Toronto is "on course to hit the 1.18 billion litre target", despite a population growth the size of Peterborough.

Of course we were on target - we had already passed it.

They went on to project the $74.3 million plan is expected to save the city around $250 million by 2011, and $4.5 million every year after that. It will also have saved the atmosphere 100,000 tonnes of greenhouse gases within the next four years, as less electricity is needed to pump water through treatment plants and then throughout the city.

So, had no one noticed we had already saved all that cash?

Makes you wonder what other decisons are made based on made-up information easily available down the hall.