A collection of top water news from around California and the West compiled each weekday. Send any comments or article submissions to Foundation Writer Matt Jenkins.
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Lake Powell, a key reservoir on the Colorado River, is
shrinking toward “dead pool,” which means water won’t flow
downriver anymore — and that could in turn pinch Wyoming’s
municipal and industrial water supplies with more demand from
Flaming Gorge Reservoir. Lake Powell, on the
Utah-Arizona state line, is in dire condition, USA Today
reported. By next spring, it’s expected to fall into “minimum
power pool,” meaning having barely just enough water to
generate hydroelectric power at Glen Canyon Dam. If it
falls even farther, that could put the reservoir at
“dead pool,” or unable to generate hydroelectric
power, according to reports. That’s despite roughly 1
million acre-feet expected to be pulled from Flaming Gorge
Reservoir on the Wyoming-Utah state line and sent downriver
through Wyoming to replenish Lake Powell.
The House of Transportation and Infrastructure Committee
approved on July 1 the authorization of $155 million under the
latest Water Resources and Development Act (WRDA) bill to
support the Sacramento River Basin, newly elected Congressman
James Gallagher (CA-01) announced. The authorization is part of
the House Water Resource Development Act (WRDA) 2026 bill,
which operates through the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers’
Environmental Infrastructure program. … If the WRDA 2026
bill passes, the $155 million would support the basin’s
water and wastewater infrastructure, environmental restoration
and surface water protection. It would support
environmental restoration meant to improve drought resilience,
salmon recovery, and bird migration without increasing flood
risk.
Gov. Gavin Newsom recently announced the appointment of Jared
Blumenfeld, former California Environmental Protection
Secretary, to the State Water Resources Control Board.
Blumenfeld served as California Environmental Protection
Secretary from 2019 to 2022. His experience also includes
serving as Regional Administrator for the U.S. Environmental
Protection Agency from 2010 to 2016. Blumenfeld will succeed
former Board Member Laurel Firestone, who
departed the State Water Resources Control Board on June 18.
Firestone was first appointed February 2019. Newsom also
announced the reappointed Dorene D’Adamo as
Vice Chair of the State Water Board earlier this year.
Blumenfeld’s appointment requires state Senate confirmation.
The next phase in the state’s crackdown on over pumping in
Tulare County will be revealed July 16 in Visalia. The meeting,
which is not open to the public, will give water managers their
first glimpse at the state’s plan for correcting severe
overdraft in the Tule subbasin. It’s known as an “interim
plan” and will definitely include pumping limits and a
fee increase from $20 to $35 per acre foot pumped. The
draft interim plan won’t be released until summer 2027 and
would have to be approved by the Water Resources Control Board
later that year before going into effect. But the clock is
ticking and the July 16 meeting is the first step to
lay out the process and timeline.
… Rock glaciers are slow-moving masses of rock debris and ice
that flow downhill the same way that glaciers do, but they are
covered by a thick layer of rock and boulders that can easily
be mistaken for stable ground. There are at least 1,500
active rock glaciers across the western U.S., and
they’re important. That’s because while the icy white glaciers
people typically picture have been shrinking and even
disappearing, our new study shows that rock glaciers and their
frozen water are remaining mostly stable despite rising
temperatures. … The result is that rock glaciers
continue to provide meltwater for streams in summer as they
always have. … Because of this, streams fed by
rock glaciers have emerged as potentially critical climate
refugia – places likely to stay cooler while everything around
them warms – for cold-water wildlife in high-mountain
ecosystems.
… Earlier this year, the Bureau of Indian Affairs and the
National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, or NOAA,
jointly offered a $5.9 million grant for tribal salmon
restoration and called for tribes to apply for the
competitive funding. … But because salmon had been
extirpated from Klamath ancestral territory for 114 years, the
federal government did not consider them a restoration tribe.
… Fortunately, the tribes’ downriver relatives had their
back; Mike Belchik, the Yurok Tribe’s senior fisheries
biologist, moved to assist. … The BIA awarded the grant
jointly between the Yurok Tribe, the Klamath Tribes, and Oregon
Fish and Wildlife. Belchik said the Yurok Tribe will act as a
pass-through, sending the money to the Klamath Tribes and
serving in an administrative capacity only.
Crews broke ground this spring on new pump stations and river
gates meant to curb Tijuana sewage flows, but two pipeline
collapses in May were a reminder of how fragile the existing
system remains, according to the latest binational progress
report. A quarterly report released this week by the U.S.
Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the U.S. Section of
the International Boundary and Water Commission outlined
construction progress, funding releases, and challenges as the
U.S. and Mexico work to address the decades-long Tijuana sewage
crisis. The EPA released a batch of previously committed
infrastructure funds after Mexico met its obligations under a
2025 agreement between the two countries — freeing Mexico to
begin construction on two new projects aimed at reducing sewage
flows into the Tijuana River.
As data centers continue to be a regional and national
hot-button issue over their use of resources compared to the
benefits they can provide to residents, Brentwood leaders are
looking for ways to ban such facilities from coming to their
city. In a joint request, Councilmembers Faye Maloney and
Jovita Mendoza are seeking to place on a future agenda an
ordinance that would prohibit the “establishment, construction,
expansion, or operation of any new data center facilities”
within the city’s limits, said Maloney. … Aside from
potential water, noise, and environmental impacts, Mendoza said
there should be better use of land to generate more jobs for
residents.
The Los Angeles Department of Power and Water issued a
boil-water notice on Wednesday for a two-block area of
Koreatown after routine testing came back positive for E. coli,
the department said. The positive test, which came on Tuesday,
was from a single water quality testing station, and did not
affect any other part of the water distribution system, the
department said. Although there was no information on what
caused the positive test result, officials said it was
unrelated to the warehouse fire in Boyle Heights and that
“fire-related contaminants” were not found in the water
samples.
A study examining air quality and respiratory health in
communities surrounding the Salton Sea in Southern California
shows how environmental conditions, poor housing quality, and
structural inequities combine to place children at greater risk
for respiratory illness. The Salton Sea, California’s largest
inland lake, has been shrinking as water inflows decline and
temperatures rise. The exposed lakebed generates windblown dust
that can worsen air quality and poses growing health concerns
for nearby communities. The study, conducted with 15 Latina
mothers caring for children with asthma or other respiratory
conditions, paired indoor air quality monitoring with a
photovoice project that allowed caregivers to document and
share their experiences through photographs and personal
narratives.
It’s not every day that a small mountain community in the
Sierra Nevada helps shape environmental conservation efforts on
the other side of the world. But that’s exactly what happened
when three Chilean conservationists began searching for a model
to protect their country’s rapidly changing lake region.
… For nearly 70 years, Keep Tahoe Blue has worked to
protect and restore the Lake Tahoe Basin while navigating the
challenges that come with tourism, population growth and
development. To the Chilean team, Keep Tahoe Blue represented a
successful example of how environmental stewardship and
economic vitality could coexist.
Arizona’s top water negotiator is working behind the scenes to
avoid “extremely draconian” cuts to the state’s share of the
Colorado River. It’s an eleventh-hour effort
to work with the federal government, which is expected to
release new rules for managing water in late July. Tom
Buschatzke, director of the Arizona Department of Water
Resources, briefed the public on the process of negotiations
and the state’s plans to adapt to water cutbacks. … The
three states that make up the river’s Lower Basin — Arizona,
California and Nevada, countered with a proposal to
voluntarily cut back on water use and avoid harsher, mandatory
cuts from the federal government. Now, Buschatzke
is trying to convince the federal government to adopt it.
The Stockton City Council proclaimed a local emergency
after invasive golden mussels began clogging the
city’s Delta Water Supply Project Intake Pump Station, raising
concerns about the reliability of the water
system serving nearly 200,000 customers in
northern and western Stockton. The council voted 7-0 on June 23
to ratify a local emergency proclamation issued June 19,
giving City Manager Johnny Ford expanded authority to
respond to the infestation. The resolution allows the city
manager to expedite emergency contracts and purchases, suspend
normal contracting limits, use contingency funds to cover
response costs, pursue actions necessary to protect public
health and maintain water operations, and seek state and
federal assistance.
After an exceptionally warm and dry winter, vast swaths of the
Western United States are up in flames—and conditions could get
worse. Several large fires are burning in Arizona,
Colorado, New Mexico, Wyoming, Nevada and Utah. In Colorado,
three federal wildland firefighters died while battling a blaze
over the weekend. … Winter weather set the stage for
this early and aggressive start to fire season. As I reported
in March, many Western states saw record or near-record lows in
snowpack coinciding with consistently high winter temperatures,
capped off by a heat wave in March that melted much of the
meager reserves. … With an even hotter, dry forecast on
the horizon, experts are concerned that the fires tearing
through much of the Southwest could be a sign of what’s to come
over the next few months.
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A long-simmering Northern California case over water use
restrictions tinged with racial overtones ended Tuesday with a
settlement. Siskiyou County and Sheriff Jeremiah LaRue reached
an agreement with the putative class over what the latter
called discriminatory traffic stops and improper search and
seizure methods. The class — which includes over 1,000 people,
many of whom are Asian American and live in a rural part of the
county called Shasta Vista — sued in 2022. They claimed the
sheriff and county used water ordinances to deprive
them in an area with no public water system. County
officials said they needed the ordinances to fight illegal
cannabis grows. On Tuesday, Chief U.S. District Judge Troy
Nunley approved the settlement agreement between the two sides.
A Kings County groundwater agency recently approved a $2.1
million budget – the minimum it will need to adhere to state
regulations – based on a future assessment election that even
its own manager doesn’t think will pass. The South Fork
Kings Groundwater Sustainability Agency (GSA) approved the plan
on June 18. It hinges on the county continuing an agreement to
loan the GSA money as an advance on existing land assessment
fees that are set to expire in 2028. A Proposition 218
election to set new land assessment fees, which has yet to be
scheduled, is expected to fail, according to South Fork General
Manager Johnny Gailey. Meanwhile, growers may be asked to
voluntarily pay a pumping fee as part of an “innovative revenue
stream” being considered.
The public’s input is being sought on ideas for long-term
resilience of two Tulare County waterways at a meeting July 7
from 1 to 3 p.m. via Zoom. The Tulare Basin Watershed
Partnership is kicking off “Sequoias to the Sloughs (S2S): A
Watershed Assessment and Stewardship Initiative” thanks to a
$300,000 grant from the Bureau of Reclamation’s WaterSMART
Cooperative Watershed Management Program. The meeting is the
inaugural event of implementing the grant. The goal is to begin
developing a unified vision for connecting the people,
agencies, and organizations along the Tule River and Deer Creek
watersheds, which begin high in the southern Sierra Nevada and
wind their way to the San Joaquin Valley floor.
U.S. Environmental Protection Agency released today its second
quarterly public update for 2026 detailing the implementation
of two historic agreements signed with Mexico in 2025 to
permanently end the years-long Tijuana River sewage crisis.
… Since the last quarterly public update in March, the
Trump Administration and Mexico have taken a number of
important actions to end the sewage crisis, including EPA
releasing previously agreed to Border Water Infrastructure
Program (BWIP) funds to begin construction on Pump Station 1
(PB-1) and Tijuana River Gates projects. Mexico is also
advancing procurement and construction of critical sewer line
and pump station rehabilitations. Additionally, both the U.S.
and Mexico have advanced progress on a suite of actions agreed
to in Minute 333, including infrastructure projects, research
studies, and planning for operation and maintenance (O&M)
of critical sites and systems that will account for future
population growth in Tijuana.
Governor Gavin Newsom today announced the release of the
California Department of Fish and Wildlife (CDFW) California
Salmon Strategy for a Hotter, Drier Future: Second Progress
Report — showcasing extensive progress on the 71 actions to
restore salmon populations mapped out in the 2024 Salmon
Strategy set by the Governor. In the last two years, the state
has fully completed 49% of the actions and partially met or
advanced progress on 51% of the actions towards safeguarding
salmon populations and their habitats. … The progress
led by the state, combined with recent wet winters, has created
a strong foundation for improving habitat, rebuilding salmon
populations, and applying new science to fisheries management.
