Next week at three public hearings, ordinary citizens will have the chance to assist the Metropolitan North Georgia Water Planning District with the agency’s long-term water management plan for the 15-county Metro Atlanta region.

At these hearings, citizens need to do more than provide “comments.” They need to perform a serious intervention because the proposals these planners have delivered are a sure sign the District has a “drinking problem.”

On the heels of a historic three-year drought, here’s what they’re delivering:

•Abandonment of an earlier pledge to achieve 20 percent water savings by 2030 for a meager 13 percent water savings by 2035-a goal that stands in sharp contrast to Gov. Sonny Perdue’s call for a 20 percent reduction across the state.

•Overreliance on new reservoir construction and transfers of water from one river basin to another to meet future water needs. Aside from being the most expensive means of extending the region’s water supply, reservoirs and water transfers threaten the water supplies of Georgia communities located downstream from Metro Atlanta.

•Overreliance on Lake Lanier as the area’s primary water supply. The plan ignores the fact that future federal court decisions may reduce the amount of water the Metro District can legally take from Lanier.

It’s time the District sobered up and faced the facts: despite recent rains, Atlanta’s water supply will remain tapped out by a continually expanding population. This recent winter downpour is merely a reprieve; drought will come again and climatologists suggest that they will be more frequent.

We cannot continue to rely so heavily on Lake Lanier; the courts won’t allow it.

And, in tight economic times, we cannot continue to rely on the most expensive, least cost-effective means of extending our water supplies-reservoir construction.

Indeed, what the District needs is a 12-step program in water conservation and efficiency. Other communities with “drinking problems” got this treatment and got straight.

In Boston, because of aggressive water conservation efforts, the metro area now uses less water than it did in 1911. The city spent $40 million on these efforts, but avoided $500 million in long-term water supply costs by reducing demand instead of investing in new water sources.

In Seattle, water conservation efforts now have the city using less water than it did in 1950. Like Boston, the city avoided $100 million in long-term water supply costs by investing $30 million in water efficiency.

Yet Metro Atlanta, despite investing millions in water planning for the region can’t even implement a comprehensive region-wide program to replace old water wasting toilets-a program that would save an estimated 42 million gallons a day by 2030.

Yes, the District water planners are acting like drunks at the taverns on Peachtree, wasting our time, our money and our water.

Interestingly, the District’s three public hearings are all in the metro area. Had they held these public hearings in Rome, LaGrange, Columbus or Macon, they might have received more than comments; they might have been met with torches and pitchforks.

For the fortunes of these communities depend on Metro Atlanta’s wise management of the water flowing by the big city. The District’s pitiful 13 percent conservation goal makes those of us downstream feel like we just hopped in the car with a drunk behind the wheel.

The District needs to go back to the drawing board with this plan, and if it doesn’t do so on its own, Governor Perdue must step in and demand that Metro Atlanta be the first to fully embrace his call for a “culture of conservation.”