Watch our series of short videos on the importance of the
Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta, how it works as a water hub for
California and the challenges it is facing.
When a person opens a spigot to draw a glass of water, he or she
may be tapping a source close to home or hundreds of miles away.
Water gets to taps via a complex web of aqueducts, canals and
groundwater.
Learn more about our team in the office and on the Board of
Directors and how you can support our nonprofit mission by
donating in someone’s honor or memory, or becoming a regular
contributor or supporting specific projects.
Unlike California’s majestic rivers and massive dams and
conveyance systems, groundwater is out of sight and underground,
though no less plentiful. The state’s enormous cache of
underground water is a great natural resource and has contributed
to the state becoming the nation’s top agricultural producer and
leader in high-tech industries.
A new era of groundwater management began in 2014 in California
with the Sustainable Groundwater Management Act. The landmark law
turned 10 in 2024, with many challenges still ahead.
Happy New Year to all the friends, supporters, readers of articles and participants of the tours and workshops we featured in 2025! We are deeply grateful to each and every person who engaged with us last year.
We have much to look forward to in 2026, especially as we gear up to mark and celebrate the Foundation’s 50th anniversary in 2027!
One of our most exciting projects this year will be replacing our 12-year-old website with a beautifully streamlined version that is mobile-adaptable. It will allow fora more intuitive experience as users conduct research, read our weekday newsfeed or water encyclopedia, and sign up for tours and events.
Along with our new website, we’ll be launching a new and improved Aquafornia newsfeed to better align with our reach across California and the Colorado River Basin. Stay tuned!
New Water Map & Spanish Version of California Water Guide
By summer, we’ll publish an update to our Layperson’s Guide to California Water in English and, for the first time, in Spanish. We will also publish a new Klamath River map to illustrate the nation’s largest dam removal project in the watershed straddling Oregon and California.
With social media, we’ll continue focusing on LinkedIn as our primary go-to channel as we ease off Facebook and X/Twitter where engagement has dropped. But not to fear; we’ll continue posting on Instagram.
Our array of 2026 programming begins later this month when we welcome our incoming California Water Leaders cohort. We’ll be sure to introduce them to you and let you know what thorny California water policy issue they’ll be tackling.
We’ll also be welcoming our third cohort of Colorado River Water Leaders in March.Applications are due Jan. 26 so be sure to get them in soon!
The biennial program, which will run from March to September
next year, selects about a dozen rising
stars from the seven states that rely on the river
– California, Nevada, Arizona, Colorado, Wyoming, Utah and New
Mexico – Mexico and tribal nations.
The seven-month program is designed for working professionals who
explore issues surrounding the iconic Southwest
river, deepen their water knowledge, and build leadership
and collaborative skills.
Listen to
a recording of our virtual Q&A session
where executive director Jenn Bowles and other Foundation staff
provided an overview on the program and tips on applying.
Negotiators for the seven states that share the shrinking
Colorado River met in Salt Lake City but could not agree on a
deal to split up the water, Arizona’s lead negotiator said.
… Talks that ran through most of the week don’t seem to
have improved the outlook for a water pact. “I didn’t see
enough progress,” Arizona Water Resources Director Tom
Buschatzke said on Friday, Jan. 16, “or any major progress”
suggesting a deal is imminent. Interior Secretary Doug Burgum
has invited all seven governors and their negotiators to meet
in Washington in late January, Buschatzke said.
… Interior officials declined to comment or confirm a
date for the meeting.
For decades Sacramento Valley farmers and water agencies
throughout California have championed the need for another
reservoir to bolster the state’s water supply. But deciding who
should build it, as of late, has become more controversial,
complicated by pushback from local labor unions. … Surrounded
by protesters, the Sites Project Authority board and Reservoir
Committee members voted [Friday] to finalize a contract with
Barnard Construction Company to build dams, roads and bridges
for the reservoir expected to hold 1.5 million acre feet of
water for residents throughout the state.
The entire state is in a snow drought, with conditions expected
to deepen due to record-breaking warm winter temperatures.
Colorado’s snowpack is the lowest on record for this time of
year, and major river basins are running at about 50 percent to
75 percent of normal. Much of the northwestern part of the
state, including Pitkin, Eagle, Grand and Summit counties are
in deep drought, according to the U.S. Drought Monitor, which
forecasts the dry spell to deepen across the Western Slope in
the coming weeks. … Still, the state [of Colorado] is faring
better than surrounding states when it comes to winter
precipitation. Nevada, Arizona and New
Mexico have received only about 20-30 percent of the
average snowfall by this time in January.
The same week politicians in Congress and the State House
announced progress on a decades-old pollution crisis in the
Tijuana River Valley, officials also announced a major new
spill. The U.S. International Water and Boundary Commission
notified the public Friday morning that Mexican officials
reported a failure at the Insurgentes Collector wastewater
system Thursday night that will cause 11.5 million
gallons of sewage and chemicals to spill into the
Tijuana River daily, pending repairs. … Alex Padilla
said [Thursday] they had arranged nearly $3.5 million in
federal aid for a dredging project to remove sediment, trash
and debris from Smuggler’s Gulch to reduce pollution and
flooding in local communities.
Operated by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, the
Bay Model is a giant hydraulic replica of San Francisco
Bay and the Sacramento-San Joaquin
Delta. It is housed in a converted World II-era
warehouse in Sausalito near San Francisco.
Hundreds of gallons of water are pumped through the
three-dimensional, 1.5-acre model to simulate a tidal ebb
and flow lasting 14 minutes.
As part of the historic Colorado
River Delta, the Salton Sea regularly filled and dried for
thousands of years due to its elevation of 237 feet below
sea level.
The most recent version of the Salton Sea was formed in 1905 when
the Colorado River broke
through a series of dikes and flooded the seabed for two years,
creating California’s largest inland body of water. The
Salton Sea, which is saltier than the Pacific Ocean, includes 130
miles of shoreline and is larger than Lake Tahoe.
Drought—an extended period of
limited or no precipitation—is a fact of life in California and
the West, with water resources following boom-and-bust patterns.
During California’s 2012–2016 drought, much of the state
experienced severe drought conditions: significantly less
precipitation and snowpack, reduced streamflow and higher
temperatures. Those same conditions reappeared early in 2021
prompting Gov. Gavin Newsom in May to declare drought emergencies
in watersheds across 41 counties in California.
