Although I absolutely agree that Internet vigilante culture is a bit out of control, I'm not sure what else could be done here. There have already been numerous reports of Oprah getting tankers to deliver water to her home, little significant action taken to respond to the drought because apparently California all of a sudden decides that government has limits, and people who live in that neighborhood are not going to respond to anything but ridiculously steep rate increases. Sometimes people do douchbaggy things that are completely legal. Public criticism of their actions is fair game IMO and is also perfectly legal.
Call your state representative and let them know you want market pricing for water.
A 2011 study found that the average California household used used more than 360 gallons of water per day [1]. Let's round that up to 500. Each household gets 500 gallons per day at a price that covers the pipes, i.e. the price you pay today. Nobody cares whether you drink it, use it to water your lawn, or grow 92 heads of broccoli [2]. From the five hundred and first gallon you start paying a price that reflects the fact that fresh, potable water is a scarce and rival good.
At least the criticism should attempt to be fair. I have no idea what Oprah is doing with her water tankers or where they come from, but in Palo Alto, for example, getting water by tanker can be an entirely reasonable and even environmentally responsible thing to do.
There are places, Palo Alto included, which produce large amounts of recycled water suitable for irrigation but haven't yet built out the infrastructure to pipe it directly to users.
So criticizing people may be reasonable, but it's worth checking whether the criticism is justified first.
>>There have already been numerous reports of Oprah getting tankers to deliver water to her home
If those tankers bring water from a place where water is plentiful, that actually sounds like a very reasonable thing to do, and she should be praised, not ostracized for it.
