Midvale City Council confirmed its water-saving plan on Oct. 7. The strategy, which is an element of the city’s general plan, expands on efforts underway to fix aging pipes and educate residents on ways to preserve water.

“This water use and preservation element is basically…homework that the legislature gave the cities,” Midvale’s Planning Director Wendelin Knobloch said to the council in October.

The Utah State Legislature started requiring municipalities to submit a water preservation plan in 2022. That same year, the Great Salt Lake hit the lowest water level in its history, posing the risk of ecological collapse.

“It seems anyone who lives in Utah has heard some type of public message regarding the Great Salt Lake,” Knobloch said. “...Everyone hears about water conservation, and it's been so consistent due to the crisis with the Great Salt Lake that sometimes people get tired of it.”

Knobloch said water use has been slowly creeping up, driven primarily by outdoor water use.

But Midvale has seen a downward trend in water use for over 20 years.

According to the 2025 Water Conservation Plan, Midvale’s water consumption decreased from roughly 250 gallons per capita per day (GPCD) in 1998 to 148 gallons per day in 2023, bringing Midvale’s daily water consumption well below Salt Lake County’s goal of each city consuming 187 GPCD.

Not only did Midvale reach the county’s preservation goal, but the city also met the state legislature's 2019 goal of lowering water use by 25% by 2025.

“We really have done a lot here in Midvale to do our part, and we hopefully can continue to do even more,” Mayor Dustin Gettel said.

The water preservation plan says the city aims to lower water use by 11% in 2030 amounting to approximately 131.72 GCPD.

“This goal will be achieved by implementing the proposed conservation measures and educating city residents about Jordan Valley Water Conservancy District conservation measures that are now available to them,” the plan states.

Alongside educating the public, the proposed measures include monthly reviews of the city’s water meters to identify leaks and quickly repair faulty pipes. Midvale also approved a measure to expand its meter system to include fire hydrants, allowing the amount of water purged when flushing the hydrant system to be accounted for.

“A lot of work has been done moving more towards the items that are maybe a little harder to attack,” Knobloch said. “But in general, and this is probably not news to anyone, we have a growing population. That means we will use more water. We can help that process along a little bit by conserving, but we are still going to use more water.”

Midvale’s population stood at 33,000 in 2024 and is estimated to jump to 55,000 in the next 30 years, according to data cited in the city’s water conservation plan.

To meet the future demand for water, Midvale will need to buy roughly 5,170 acre-feet more water annually from the Jordan Valley Water Conservancy District, according to Midvale’s Drinking Water System Master Plan.

Knobloch said the JVWCD knows about Midvale’s growing water needs, and the conservancy district has water banked to accommodate the increasing population. But if the city ends up not needing the saved water, it can be released into the Great Salt Lake.

“So that in and of itself is…one motivation for people to really stick with conserving water,” he said.

    Water zone map from the water conservation plan. (Giovanni Radtke/City Journals)