LAST WEEK’S PUC hearings on the Monterey Peninsula’s water supply led us to criticize community groups that are always against everything and that showed up again in front of the PUC to explain why the Regional Water Project should be downsized, moved or not built at all.

The concerns these groups expressed over the cost of the desalinated water, rights to the underground water that would supply the desal plant, and something called “governance” were just phony excuses to mask the groups’ real purpose: to prevent any water from being available for new development.

But if there’s no water for development at all, families can’t remodel their homes, business opportunities are nonexistent, vacant parcels lose almost all their value, housing prices go up faster than they otherwise would, and downtowns stagnate.

Carmel, for example, has seen its full-time population fall sharply since its peak of 4,707 in 1970. In the evening, the streets are often empty. Who can argue that even that small city wouldn’t benefit from a few apartments being added downtown every year? But none can be, because there’s no water.

In Pacific Grove, the damage wrought by the H2O shortage is even more acute. The Holman building, for example, is a ghastly, little-used dinosaur that occupies an entire block. Imagine how the city’s business district would benefit if 200 or 300 people lived in the former department store. Developers would line up around the block to convert the old place into a lovely combination of stores, condos and apartments, if only water were available.

Not only does the water shortage hurt businesses, property owners and entire communities, it especially damages the younger generation, people who are trying to climb out of the lower income groups, and people who would like to live in Carmel, P.G., or Monterey but can’t quite afford to.

All this is indisputable. But the no-water community groups are still there, demanding that even the Regional Water Project, which contains not a drop of new water, be downsized.

In a letter printed elsewhere on this page, a member of one of these groups, the local chapter of the League of Women Voters, argues that we were wrong to put the league in the no-water camp. Pointing to the league’s position papers on its website, she argues that the group’s members are sincerely and adamantly in favor of affordable housing on the Monterey Peninsula.

Great! Since they are, we expect them to drop their calls for the regional project to be delayed and downsized, and to start calling for it to be made larger and built now.