Silicon Valley water district freezes hiring as project costs, homelessness take budget toll

SILICON VALLEY’S MAIN water supplier is tightening its wallet in the face of a structural deficit and in an effort to keep water rates from rising.

Santa Clara Valley Water District officials have frozen hiring for 72 job vacancies amid a $222 million budget deficit for the current fiscal year ending in June. The skyrocketing price tags for projects like the Andersen Dam and Pacheco Reservoir expansion, in addition to the rising cost of cleaning waterways polluted by unhoused residents, are the cause for the ballooning shortfall expected to increase to $300 million in 2024-25 and $350 million the following fiscal year, according to a March Valley Water presentation.