Haley Salazar, Denton’s water resources administrator, told the Sustainability Framework Advisory Committee on Sept. 26 that the city is rolling out a suite of irrigation-focused incentives intended to lower discretionary summer water use.

Salazar said the city’s lawn and landscape ordinance (adopted in 02/2006) and its water conservation and drought contingency plan provide the authority and framework for the new measures. She said the conservation component of the updated plan included a mandatory twice‑a‑week irrigation schedule that went live May 1 and that the utility is using a three‑year education-first approach before stronger enforcement.

The incentives Salazar described focus on irrigation because the utility attributes most summer demand spikes to discretionary outdoor watering. "Irrigation accounts for 70% of our discretionary water use," Salazar said, adding that if the city achieves roughly 70% compliance with a twice‑a‑week schedule it could free capacity to serve an additional 16,000 residents without upsizing infrastructure.

The city’s current incentive offerings, as described by Salazar:
- Controller rebate: Residents who install EPA WaterSense‑approved smart controllers can be reimbursed up to $300; 26 residents had applied at the time of the presentation. The city bills the rebate on the utility account after residents submit receipts and proof of installation.
- Irrigation evaluation: A licensed irrigator on staff conducts a free, on‑site evaluation to identify leaks, misaligned heads and "ghost" settings on older controllers; 28 residents requested evaluations and another 51 used the evaluation as a prerequisite for the turf buyback program.
- Sprinkler tune‑up rebate: A $100 rebate for third‑party, licensed irrigation contractors to perform repairs and tuneups; residents can use the rebate twice per year.
- Turf buyback: The city offers $5 per square foot to remove irrigated turf (minimum 400 sq. ft.); rebates decline to $2–$3.50 per sq. ft. for removals over 10,000 sq. ft. The program requires an irrigation evaluation, a simple landscape design, a site verification, a signed pledge to permanently cap irrigation to that area and a one‑year completion window after a notice to proceed. Salazar said 51 residents had applied and about 20 had completed the process so far.

Salazar said the programs are intentionally residential‑first because irrigation is the largest discretionary category; the city estimates about 47,000 residential accounts, roughly half of which have irrigation systems ("somewhere in the 20,000 range"). She also said the utility currently uses AMR metering but expects advanced metering infrastructure (AMI) in future years; AMI would enable near‑real‑time leak detection and targeted outreach to irrigating accounts.

Committee members asked about commercial and institutional outreach; Salazar said city staff plan to expand incentives to commercial and institutional sites (including DISD, TWU, UNT and county properties) and to work with the development community to encourage reduced turf in new construction. She described changes to the development point table to reduce turf requirements (from a historical 60% turf threshold to guidance encouraging 30% or less, with extra points for 10% or less) and said staff are working on code changes and guidance for subterranean drip irrigation for new trees.

On enforcement, Salazar outlined a graded compliance process: an informational mailing and magnet for first notices, a warning letter if a second report arrives within 10 days, an on‑site door knock and hanger for repeated violations, and, as a final step, a municipal court referral that could include court fees and fines up to $2,000 (no municipal‑court referrals had occurred to date). She said staff are seeking an ordinance change that would allow administrative fines rather than pursuing court in all cases.

Salazar also described outreach and program supports: a list of local nurseries and contractors engaged through twice‑yearly conservation meetings, a yard‑sign program to recognize participants, rain‑barrel classes, and planned partnerships with UNT and students for landscape designs and monitoring. She said the utility is tracking return on investment and expects the turf buyback to be a loss in year one, break even in year two and show net benefits by year three, though some secondary neighborhood adoption effects are difficult to quantify.

Committee members asked for a retrospective in October and for more data as the program matures. Salazar said staff will continue to refine program details and that marketing and AMI deployment are next steps.

The presentation and discussion were part of the committee’s regular meeting; no immediate enforcement changes were announced other than the outlined staged compliance approach.