It was north of 100 degrees in Manteca last Saturday at 3 p.m.

There were at least two homeowners that were having sod installed.

You could find a few that were watering lawns in violation of common sense and city rules prohibiting such wanton inefficient use of water between noon and 6 p.m. regardless of the day.

And there were many more with dry, brown and dusty front yards that looked like movie sets for a modern remake of “The Grapes of Wrath”.

Welcome to the delusional state of water use in not just Manteca, but most of California.

Manteca has four key issues regarding livability and sustainability that must be addressed.

*Drought is a part of an established natural cycle for California including Manteca long before anyone strung the two worlds “climate” and “change” together.

*Non-native grass — decadent eye candy if you will — is consuming an inordinate amount of a limited water supply.

*Residential property upkeep that makes a homeless encampment look tidy in comparison.

*The seemingly lack of political will — and municipal commitment — to keep the eye on the future whenever periods of high precipitation occur.

There are signs the current council may have the foresight and the moxie to save us from ourselves.

Mayor Gary Singh on Tuesday said he’d like the council to consider relaxing its outside watering restrictions by going back to three days a week from the current two in light of the improved “short-term” water outlook.

Singh emphasized that he thought most rules should remain in place and efforts stepped up to further reduce water use.

Several weeks ago, Singh noted if people follow other city rules in place about the duration of lawn watering and making sure they don’t gutter flood as many responsible homeowners are now doing, that returning to three-day-a-week watering could be justified.

Councilman Charlie Halford was quick to follow Singh’s comments about water rules Tuesday

Halford noted essentially it is unwise for the city to not continue pursuing a stepped up effort to use water more wisely given supplies are going to continue to be threatened by re-occurring droughts, long-needed groundwater sustainability mandates that are being put in place, and demands to divert Delta water flows.

It’s not that the city doesn’t have the basic framework for making Manteca look better and conserve water. It does.

At the same meeting Tuesday when a council member asked about the status of the city’s turf conversion program, they were told — somewhat proudly I might add — that there had been 25 such conversions in the past year.

That is 25 out of almost 25,000 residential and commercial properties. Translated, that is 0.10 percent of all property in Manteca. If that is a successful effort then the Oakland A’s are on track to be the World Series champions this year.

The city clearly needs to double down on the turf replacement program and push it more aggressively.

It offers a $1 per square foot rebate up to 650 square feet of residential front lawns and 5,000 square feet of commercial property.

They also need to find ways to further reduce the fact eye-candy lawns — primarily front yards and commercial — consume the lion’s share of water in Manteca.

Among things the city could do:

*Outlaw the use of any front yard turf of any new home built in Manteca starting Jan. 1, 2024. A mechanism also needs to be in place that not only heavily fines those who replace non-turf with grass at such homes but also forces then to restore non-turf landscaping.

*Starting Jan. 1, 2025, require any existing home going through escrow to have front yard turf replaced with water-efficient landscape suited to the Northern San Joaquin Valley region’s semi-arid climate. Penalties and enforcement would also be required should someone replace such landscaping with grass.

*Have a property upkeep ordinance modified or put in place by Jan. 1, 2025 that prohibits leaving more than a set amount of a front yard bare and requiring water-efficient landscape and hardscape instead while not allowing cement to cover any area larger than allowed under residential uses.

Water — especially that secured and delivered through public means — needs to be treated as an essential and limited resource.

Just because someone can afford to pay to use all the water they want is not a justification to do so.

It is crazy that we are planting sod in n the middle of an endless summer of heat waves that requires extensive watering every day until it is established.

It is crazy we are planting lawns that are not suited for our Mediterranean climate. As such, they require an inordinate high amount of water to survive.

It is crazy the city gives homeowners basic passes on front yard upkeep that contributes to blight.

There is no reasonable defense for a well-manicured, non-native water-hog front yard.

It is a generational sin in the Golden State to view such lawns as standard instead of for what they really are — an aberration against the nature of California.

We squawk about Wall Street agricultural concerns using water taken from the north state to farm marginal land while at the same time adding to the salinity.

We squawk about Los Angeles et al continuing efforts to put bigger and more effective straws into water basins hundreds of miles away to sustain itself and fuel growth that can’t be supported within their own water basin.

Yet, urban water use numbers show city residents in the Great Central Valley are  among the largest water consumers in the state on a per capita basis.

Some of it has to do with 6,000 to 12,000 square foot lots.

But it has much more to do with  what we plant on those lots.

Outside irrigation in residential neighborhoods is off the charts due to what we primarily plant which is eye-candy grass.

Rare are the households that use front yards for anything but something to look at.

Easing watering rules to allow three times a week irrigation is likely reasonable in the short term.

But the answer that will serve current residents and future generations the best is to move forward by not adding more water thirsty front yard lawns and working to convert those already in place.

The best time to do that is not in the middle of a drought when the only alternative could well be letting everything die due to high water consumption.

In the past 100 years with the onslaught of development better suited for a rainy East Coast plain, the grass has never been greener in California.

And that is not a good thing.

This column is the opinion of editor, Dennis Wyatt, and does not necessarily represent the opinions of The Bulletin or 209 Multimedia. He can be reached at dwyatt@mantecabulletin.com