Water Festival offers activities, tours, demos

Take a peek behind the scenes at Elsinore Valley Municipal Water District’s annual Splash into Spring Water Festival on Saturday, Mar. 24, from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. at EVMWD, 31315 Chaney St., Lake Elsinore.

This free family event offers tours of the water treatment plant, conservation demonstrations, landscape ideas, plant displays, children’s activities and water and wastewater related trucks and equipment. The Lake Elsinore Sheriff and American Medical Response will be on hand with emergency vehicles for children to explore.

There will be special visits from EVMWD’s Elsinore Eddie, the Lake Elsinore Storm’s Thunder Dog and Lake Elsinore/San Jacinto Watershed Authority’s Bessie the Bass.

Staff will share their daily work at the district through a variety of demonstrations and interactive displays. Activities include fixing a leaky water main, performing a valve exercise, cleaning up a polluted watershed and exploring pipes with robotics and video cameras. A crowd favorite is a tour of the facility’s sewer treatment plant, where visitors take a journey through the plant to see how wastewater becomes recycled water.

Tours of Elsinore Eddie’s Efficient Gardens at the headquarters are also a highlight of the event, giving visitors an idea of how beautiful a water-efficient landscape can be.

Landscape and irrigation experts, University of California Riverside Master Gardeners, local nurseries and irrigation specialists. Home improvement stores will be on hand to answer questions about outdoor irrigation, California-friendly plants, gardening and water-saving appliances and devices.

There will be free refreshments for visitors. Customers of EVMWD can receive a free hose nozzle or shower head while supplies last. Scout troops can earn their Water Explorer Badge when they visit this event.

For more information, visit www.evmwd.com/splash or call 951-674-3146, ext. 8274.