California - Toilet to tap redux ...

The treatment of the community the first time around sounds ominously like the experience in Toowoomba ...

Excerpt from Daily News:

Toilet-to-tap redux

18 May 2008

Toilet-to-tap is back. And with the future water supplies for Los Angeles so uncertain, it deserves a fresh - if wary - look.

About seven years after public pressure killed a controversial plan to use recycled sewer water in the San Fernando Valley, Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa is proposing to revive the idea as part of a $2 billion multifaceted water use and conservation plan.

This time, however, officials say the technology is better, and that the recycled water won't just be used in the Valley.

Let's hope that's true, because water use is shaping up to be one of the biggest challenges facing California as growth puts new demands on a dwindling supply. As such, it's important for the city to take decisive steps to conserve and reuse water wherever possible.

But this time around, city officials must do a better job of answering the old - and valid - concerns about safety and quality than they did when toilet-to-tap first made its debut.

Back then, the city made only nominal attempts to notify residents of the plan. And when the public was finally clued in, officials were circumspect with the details.

Even then-Valley Councilman Joel Wachs couldn't get a straight answer about who would use the water, how it would be distributed and how the Department of Water and Power would deal with possible contamination. Those were legitimate concerns then, and remain so today.
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See - LA Daily News - Toilet-to-tap redux.

Also see - Wall Street Journal - Sewer to Spigot.