In a clear indicator that California is descending into a fourth year of drought, the federal government on Friday announced that the Central Valley Project — California’s largest water delivery system — will provide no water again this year to most Central Valley farmers and only 25 percent of the contracted amount to urban areas such as Santa Clara, Alameda and Contra Costa counties.
One newly introduced bill would speed approval of Sites Reservoir in the Sacramento Valley. Another would help restore San Francisco Bay habitat. More targeted bills are coming.
Hundreds of property owners across California’s Central Valley and the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta are scrambling to prove they have a right to divert water from the region’s streams, the result of a state order that comes due in just four days.
A state agency has lowered the Public Health Goal for perchlorate, a dangerous pollutant found in many underground water basins across the Southland – including the Rialto-Colton area and the San Fernando and San Gabriel valleys.
California lawmakers led by Rep. Jackie Speier, D-Hillsborough, and Democratic Sens. Dianne Feinstein and Barbara Boxer introduced legislation last week to double the amount of federal grants to restore the bay, the largest estuary on the West Coast, to $10 million a year.
A new bill from Assemblyman Eduardo Garcia would hasten efforts to clean up the New River, which flows from Mexico into the Salton Sea and has long been known as one of America’s most polluted waterways.
In another blow to California’s parched heartland, federal officials said Friday that for the second year in a row most Central Valley farmers are unlikely to receive water from the region’s major irrigation project this summer.
The US Bureau of Reclamation says most farmers south of the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta will face a second year with no water from the Central Valley Project.
The federal government said Friday it won’t send any of its reservoir water to the Central Valley for the second straight year, forcing farmers in California’s agricultural heartland to again scramble for other sources or leave fields unplanted.
In a sign that the drought actually has worsened, federal officials on Friday announced an unprecedented second consecutive year with no water deliveries to many farms up and down the Central Valley.
Hundreds of farmers in the Central Valley were told Friday they can expect zero water deliveries this year from the federal government, the latest fallout from what is likely to be a fourth straight drought year in California. … The announcement does not affect all farms.
In snow surveys taken Tuesday, the Nevada Irrigation District measured 16 percent of average water content in the mountain snowpack that supplies the NID water system, according to a news release.
The California drought and a strange warming trend in the ocean have not yet killed off the Sacramento River’s king salmon, which are swimming off the coast unaware of all the doomsaying.
A regional sewer board has approved a $114 million contract with Teichert Construction of Davis despite receiving another bid that was $13.8 million lower.
A state panel’s decision this week to approve $365,000 in grants to help buy undeveloped land in southwest Riverside County will help preserve habitat for six animals increasingly pressured by development.
But despite a four-year drought with no relief in sight, pools and green lawns continue to be attractive selling points, say real estate agents across Los Angeles and San Bernardino counties.
The Young Leaders Society, a United Way subset made up of young Sacramento-area professionals, recently launched the Hydration Station Initiative to bring clean, cold water to students in the Robla School District as soon as this summer.
A winter storm sweeping through Southern California on Sunday brought scattered showers, hail and thunderstorms, while ski resorts have prepared for up to a foot of snow.
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