Sherman Oaks Water Hardness & Quality Report (2026)

Sherman Oaks, California, a neighborhood in the San Fernando Valley of Los Angeles — an upper-middle-class San Fernando Valley residential neighborhood known for the Sherman Oaks Galleria, the Valley Village arts district, and a diverse Jewish-American and Iranian-American community — draws its municipal water supply from the Owens Valley Aqueduct (LADWP long-distance import from the Eastern Sierra) and Metropolitan Water District imports blended with San Fernando Basin groundwater via the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power (LADWP). Water hardness in Sherman Oaks measures 61 mg/L — classified as moderately soft.

Sherman Oaks' moderate softness — unusually soft for the San Fernando Valley — reflects the LADWP's Owens Valley Aqueduct supply dominance in the Sherman Oaks distribution zone. The Owens Valley Aqueduct (carrying Eastern Sierra Nevada snowmelt from the Owen Valley — draining the Sierra Nevada Batholith granite and White–Inyo Mountains calcareous-poor crystalline terrain) is moderately soft. The blended LADWP supply in the Sherman Oaks distribution zone — which receives a high proportion of the soft Owens Valley import — produces the moderate 61 mg/L at Sherman Oaks, softer than many San Fernando Valley communities that rely on harder MWD Colorado River imports.

With hardness at 61 mg/L, Sherman Oaks residents enjoy moderately soft water with minimal scale challenges. LADWP consistently delivers water meeting all California SWRCB and EPA Safe Drinking Water Act requirements.