Santee, CA Landscaping Rules: Water Restrictions (2026)

Santee Municipal Code § 13.36.080, adopted with the rest of Chapter 13.36 by Ordinance 566 in 2019, prohibits water waste from inefficient landscape irrigation: runoff may not leave the target landscape because of low head drainage, overspray, or similar conditions that send water onto adjacent property, nonirrigated areas, walks, roadways, parking lots, structures, or other nontargeted surfaces. The chapter's own findings in Section 13.36.010(A)(13)(e) describe this overspray prohibition and storm-runoff retention design as part of why the ordinance is at least as effective at conserving water as the State Model Water Efficient Landscape Ordinance.

Rather than posting fixed watering days or hours, Santee enforces water restrictions through purveyor-run audits: Section 13.36.050(B) requires the City or the local water purveyor to administer irrigation water use analyses, irrigation surveys, and irrigation audits on metered landscapes over one acre that were installed before December 1, 2015, calculating a maximum applied water allowance under a formula built from reference evapotranspiration, landscape area, and an 0.8 evapotranspiration adjustment factor. Section 13.36.050(C) requires every irrigation audit performed under the chapter to be conducted by a certified landscape irrigation auditor.

New and rehabilitated landscapes carry a tighter water budget up front: Section 13.36.010(A)(13)(d) sets the evapotranspiration adjustment factor at 0.55 for residential landscapes and 0.45 for nonresidential landscapes, while recycled-water special landscape areas are capped at an ETAF of 1.0 under Section 13.36.060(C). Any landscape found wasting water through overspray or runoff, or failing a purveyor audit, is subject to the citywide administrative citation process in Section 1.08.020.