Environmental Leadership in Indio: Councilmember Ortiz Discusses Key Initiatives

Show Announcer: 00:00:01

The Desert Healthcare District and Foundation presents a podcast that supports your health and wellness where you live. This is Healthy Desert, Healthy youy, hosted by Will Dean. Now here's Will.

Will Dean, Host: 00:00:16

Hello, friends. Welcome to the Healthy Desert, Healthy you podcast.

This is a new podcast presented by the Desert Healthcare District and Foundation, and we started this to continue conversations. We began last September when we hosted the inaugural Healthy Desert, Healthy U Environmental Health Summit.

One of the participants of that summit was Indio City Councilman Oscar Ortiz. He is here with us today. Welcome, Councilman.

Oscar Ortiz, Guest: 00:00:46

Thank you. Thank you for having me.

Will Dean, Host: 00:00:47

Appreciate it. We're very happy to have you here because I understand Indio is doing a lot in terms of addressing the environmental challenges in the city of Indio.

And I want to talk to you about that. I think it's really interesting and fascinating that NDO is really becoming a leader in this movement.

Oscar Ortiz, Guest: 00:01:06

Definitely.

Will Dean, Host: 00:01:07

So what are the key ways that Indio is addressing environmental challenges?

Oscar Ortiz, Guest: 00:01:11

You know, I think in the past few years, one of the things that we've been doing is looking regionally at what's going on in different cities, different regions, all throughout our region. You know, sometimes if we're looking just locally, everything looks like it's going okay.

And we look regionally, and we see that there's so much more. More work to do.

And so we've been building on that and looking at how we can be a leader in the region in helping address some of these issues that we're seeing coming up around our communities.

Will Dean, Host: 00:01:38

Are there specific programs that you have in place?

Oscar Ortiz, Guest: 00:01:41

Yeah, we do have the India Water Authority there. We do have a few programs.

One of them that we just upgraded last year, which was our turf removal program, so we give people a financial incentive to remove their grass.

One of the things we were seeing, again regionally and all throughout the country with people that were using these programs, was that sometimes the grass was being replaced with just rock or other types of sediment.

Will Dean, Host: 00:02:05

Right.

Oscar Ortiz, Guest: 00:02:06

And it was actually causing heat islands because there was less water, less greenery. And you're actually seeing higher temperatures around those neighborhoods. And so what we've done is we added an extra dollar.

We went from $2 per square foot to $3 per square foot if you're including native plants.

And so that way we can kind of encourage urban greening along the way and help bring down the temperatures in those neighborhoods while we're also reducing our water use in those neighborhoods.

Will Dean, Host: 00:02:34

That is really fascinating because my understanding is that a lot of cities are really encouraging the desert landscaping.

Oscar Ortiz, Guest: 00:02:42

Yes.

Will Dean, Host: 00:02:42

And I have driven through Neighborhoods. And I've seen the boulders and the different rocks and that sort of thing.

But you're saying that incorporating native plants is really important to bringing that temperature to bring the heat down.

Oscar Ortiz, Guest: 00:02:54

Yes, yes. At the same time that we're removing the grass, which is really just water intensive. Right.

We also want to replace it with other greenery, not just rocks and sediment. We want to really, for me, I really like to encourage the native plants themselves.

The plants that have been here for thousands of years that have evolved to use very little water. Right. But we can still get things. We can get shade from the trees. They're a food resource, they're wildlife habitat, and they save a lot of water.

So you're kind of hitting all these different points with one strategy.

Will Dean, Host: 00:03:29

So when you talk about native plants and trees, you're talking about mesquite, you're talking about palo verde. Are there others that you.

Oscar Ortiz, Guest: 00:03:36

There's so many.

Will Dean, Host: 00:03:38

Yeah.

Oscar Ortiz, Guest: 00:03:39

I think we're about to update our list to about 50 plants that you can include throughout your landscape. And so there's a lot of trees, different types of shrubs, you know, lavender, lavender plants, right?

Will Dean, Host: 00:03:51

Yes.

Oscar Ortiz, Guest: 00:03:51

There's a desert lavender that can grow, you know, up to 6 to 12ft tall. And it smells amazing. It's great for bees. There's also the creosote, which we see all over our desert.

That's the one that gives the smell of rain in our desert when we have that really distinct smell. When it rains out here, you're smelling the creosote from all around the desert. And actually, that plant that.

There's over 100 different species of bees that specialize just on that plant. So when they're looking for food, they're looking for creosote.

And if we start planting these all throughout our neighborhoods, we can really help our bee species, hummingbirds, all these other wildlife species out here, while reducing our water use.

Will Dean, Host: 00:04:32

That's incredible. So there are options. Your yard doesn't necessarily have to look like your neighbors.

Oscar Ortiz, Guest: 00:04:37

Yeah, there's so many options and really colorful options, too. One that I really. That I recently started planting was a chupa rosa. And so in Spanish, that means hummingbird.

And that is a plant with these really long flowers. They're either red or yellow, and they fit right into the hummingbird's beak. And so it's kind of like a. It's a really good match for them. Right.

So if you plant those, you'll see them come visit your house every day.

Will Dean, Host: 00:05:03

This is the land of hummingbirds. You see them Everywhere, all the time.

Oscar Ortiz, Guest: 00:05:08

Definitely.

Will Dean, Host: 00:05:09

I'm wondering about the turf removal program. You know, a lot of people in the valley move from other places in the country, from outside the country. They're used to grass.

Is there a lot of pushback to that, or.

Oscar Ortiz, Guest: 00:05:20

You know, there is some. And we do understand, you know, for some people, especially when you have young children, they need a play space. Right.

I think when we're going into just very large yards and entire neighborhoods and golf courses, it's just extremely water intensive. And right now, it's unsustainable. Right. We look at our groundwater system, we have a huge aquifer. Right.

And it's going to keep us good for a really long time. But again, that's here locally. You look regionally, and things are not going very well. The colorado river was going dry on us, Right.

Lake mead was almost at the point where it couldn't pump water anymore. And that's how we get water from the colorado river.

And in Arizona, you're seeing the land has subsided by several feet because you've drained so much water out of their aquifers. Central valley is the same way. We've drained so much water out of those aquifers that the land has subsided several feet down.

And you cannot regain that. That land. Right. Or that space under your land. And so I think, yeah, just keeping that in mind, that we.

We need to make some huge changes to be able to be sustainable within this desert region.

Will Dean, Host: 00:06:30

So making these changes, it all sounds really wonderful. And things that we should be doing to protect our environment.

I'm wondering, are there any obstacles to implementing environmental initiatives and programs?

Oscar Ortiz, Guest: 00:06:45

Yeah, I think one of them. Well, I think price would be an obvious one. Right. We always think about that.

But I think a secondary one is what is the actual analysis on a lot of these technologies. Right. A lot of times I bring up a lot of different strategies, and people real quick say, that's too expensive. We can't do that.

And I say, show me the numbers. And a lot of people can't show me any numbers to back that up. Right. And so times are changing. Everything's evolving. Prices are changing.

The price of lumber is changing just this past week. Right. And so we need to have good models that we can continue to change while times are changing. To see how far are we from these.

From these strategies being financially feasible. One of the ones that I was looking at is solar power. So if you look at solar in sce territory, there's a lot better incentives. Once you cross into I.

D territory, there's not much incentives there. So it's not financially feasible for people to go solar.

So if you cross that line into IID territory, you'll notice right away that the older homes, hardly anybody has solar.

And one thing that we propose is let's look at the financial analysis of if we were to invest the city with IID into solar and have a partnership with our residents, can we centralize that to ease the strain on the grid and then use the extra solar that's available to produce hydrogen power? But again, we don't have that financial analysis and we haven't been able to get the buy in from the power company yet. Not yet, but one day we will.

Will Dean, Host: 00:08:17

Yeah, I was going to ask about that. Utility companies especially, is it difficult to work with them? Do they seem open?

If the bottom line makes sense for them, that's usually a big part of the deciding factor.

Oscar Ortiz, Guest: 00:08:30

You know what, sometimes I think we, we can't even get to those numbers. That's been a struggle that I've been seeing. So I had a nine page proposal that I sent in and I got a paragraph back that said we're not interested.

in: 2033

Our contract will be coming up and so we have room to negotiate. We have some leverage here and I think we're going to keep pushing those, those conversations.

Will Dean, Host: 00:08:59

I love that.

One of the things I always want to, or I like to ask is what can residents do right now in their lives to make a positive impact, whether it's in their individual lives, collectively for the community. You talked about turf removal, about planting native plants and trees. What are some other things that people can actually do right now?

Oscar Ortiz, Guest: 00:09:22

I think one of the things that I would like to see is we focus so much on what is easier, right. What is cheaper to do. I think we have to kind of work backwards a bit.

We've been given a lot of things that are cheap and fast but are not good for our communities. Right. The native. I've heard from a lot of native communities here that they plan for seven generations. Right?

The way that we're working right now, we're not planning for seven generations. We're causing a lot of pollution, a lot of plastic use, single plastic use. Right. Even the paints that we use for our homes, construction materials.

So I always like to go backwards a bit and see how did we do this before we had these new materials that are toxic to Our community. One of the things that I started looking into recently was straw houses.

So people used to build houses out of straw bales and they would cover them with plaster and adobe and they're actually a lot more energy efficient and they can also be fireproof. So right now we're seeing all these issues in wildfire areas throughout California. Right, right.

If we start building with these materials, they're non toxic, they're probably easier to build, and they could be really energy efficient. And so that's something that I would like to see us start getting into and start doing some pilot projects on these types of homes.

How do we modernize these technologies to make a really nice looking home that doesn't have, you know, all these toxic paints or asbestos. Right. Or polyurethane foams? How do we start working backwards and rediscovering some of those techniques that we used to have?

Will Dean, Host: 00:10:57

It's really fascinating. And before we started the podcast, you were telling me that you studied chemistry at Stanford.

Oscar Ortiz, Guest: 00:11:03

Yes.

Will Dean, Host: 00:11:03

Have you always been passionate about environmental protection or is it a recent development?

Oscar Ortiz, Guest: 00:11:09

No, I think so, because I learned a lot of natural ways to do things back in Mexico. Right. So I was born in Mexico and I spent a lot of time there as a youth and we just didn't have the same technological advances. Right.

That we had here. So I remember working in the garden with my grandfather and growing our own food right there in the yard.

I remember the medicines that they used to give us. A lot of times you would go through a few natural medicines before you ever went to a doctor. Right.

And so learning how to problem solve with what you have around you is just a really good technique to have. And I've always kept that with me and try to just simplify things for people.

And how can we solve this here locally with the things that we grow, with the things that we have in our natural environment?

Will Dean, Host: 00:11:53

Technology is wonderful. I mean, we're sitting here doing a podcast, but some of those traditional ways of living are really valuable as well.

Things that we need to bring back.

Oscar Ortiz, Guest: 00:12:02

Yes.

Will Dean, Host: 00:12:02

You know, you mentioned something really interesting about planning for future generations. I often think about that.

I'm not a parent, but I have younger people in my family and I think about what they're inheriting or going to inherit from us, and it's really scary.

Oscar Ortiz, Guest: 00:12:18

It is, yeah. Right now, you know, even the oceans. Right. The health of the oceans right now is not looking very good. We talked about the Salton Sea earlier.

We see that that's gone down about 13ft in about 20 years.

Will Dean, Host: 00:12:30

Thirteen feet.

Oscar Ortiz, Guest: 00:12:32

Thirteen feet, yeah. And the, you know, the salts in there are concentrating the fertilizers that have been running in there for hundred years or so. Right.

Pesticides, everything's concentrating. And a lot of that is more concentrated at the center at the deepest part of the ocean. And so as the sea continues to evaporate, it'll actually start.

Start bringing out all these even more toxic things that we haven't been exposed to.

Will Dean, Host: 00:12:58

Let's talk about the evaporation. A lot of people talk about the dust and the health effects of that, but there are some other concerns that people should have. Right.

Regarding the Salton Sea.

Oscar Ortiz, Guest: 00:13:10

So UCR has been.

UC Riverside has been putting out some lectures and talks about the health of the water itself and that we're seeing because of the extremities of that water, the high salt concentrations. They're just very extreme bacteria that are surviving and they're also producing other things.

So the cell membrane of some of those bacteria is what they call lps. And their theory right now is that LPS is in the sea breeze. So kind of when you're at the ocean, you feel a little sea breeze sometimes. Right.

Will Dean, Host: 00:13:41

And we love that usually.

Oscar Ortiz, Guest: 00:13:43

But there's also a sea breeze coming from the Salton Sea.

And that LPS is getting into the water molecules, it's getting onto the dust, and it's getting into our bodies and it could be causing inflammation response within the lungs of our population.

Will Dean, Host: 00:13:59

Right.

And one of the things I've learned in doing the podcast is that the, the impact of asthma diagnoses in around the Salton Sea, especially among children, is really high.

Oscar Ortiz, Guest: 00:14:10

Yes. And so, yeah, so we really just. I think we're getting. It's another variable that we've uncovered. Right.

Or the UC Riverside has helped uncover for a long time. It was the dust. It was just the dust. And our planning was revolving around the dust because that's the information we had.

But now we have more information. Right. And now we can plan for both of those variables. And we need to keep looking for. There's probably more variables there. Right.

So we just need to be open minded and continue to look at the research in depth and continue to evolve our plans to evolve with the research.

Will Dean, Host: 00:14:45

So when you know better, you do better, as Maya Angelou says, Definitely one of the reasons why we're here today. Anything else that you want our listeners to really take away from this podcast about what Indio's doing, what needs to be done?

Oscar Ortiz, Guest: 00:15:01

I think right now we're just having we're expanding our conversations Right. To all these leaders throughout the whole state and around the country.

And I just got back from Yosemite, and there was a climate change conference that we went up there for policymakers. So I met with a lot of supervisors, council members, and we shared ideas. Right.

And we're kind of going in debates and we're challenging each other's ideas so that we can sharpen each other up. Right.

So that we can come back to home and have new strategies, vet our strategies a bit better with other professionals, and come back with better solutions here for our community.

Will Dean, Host: 00:15:36

Well, Yosemite certainly is a beautiful place to have conversations about the environment. It's inspiring, I'm sure.

Oscar Ortiz, Guest: 00:15:43

Yeah, definitely.

Will Dean, Host: 00:15:44

Well, again, I want to thank you for being here. Please come back and talk with us more about what's going on in Indio.

Oscar Ortiz, Guest: 00:15:51

Thanks for having me again.

Will Dean, Host: 00:15:53

Absolutely. Anyone who wants to know more about the programs in Indio can actually visit a couple of web Pages, websites.

There's Indio.org and there's Indiowater.org as well.

Oscar Ortiz, Guest: 00:16:05

I'd also like to invite anybody you know. Our city council meetings are open to the public.

We have a sustainability commission, community services commissions, and those are also available online if you'd like to watch those. So you can keep up with some of the things that we're doing through those public meetings as well.

Will Dean, Host: 00:16:19

Perfect. Thank you again.

Oscar Ortiz, Guest: 00:16:21

Thank you.

Show Announcer: 00:16:22

Thank you for joining us on this episode of Healthy Desert. Healthy youy. This podcast is a production of the Desert Healthcare District and Foundation in Palm Springs, California.

For more information, please Visit the website dhcd.org Our annual conference site is Healthy Desert healthyyou.org this podcast is available at most major podcast portals, including Amazon Music, Apple podcasts, Audible, Captivate FM, Spotify, and YouTube Music.