… [T]here is no looming mandate banning new construction of any type — from the foundation up or adding on to homes, retail concerns, employment centers and such — hanging over Los Angeles, San Diego, San Francisco, San Jose, and Oakland when it comes to flooding predicted from climate change. There is on large swaths of the San Joaquin Valley and the Sacramento Valley. If physical work hasn’t at least started to protect 200-year floodplains by 2030, the state has mandated that no new construction — or adding square footage to existing structures — can take place. The mandate impacts 24 cities, including six in the San Joaquin Valley: Manteca, Lathrop, Stockton, Tracy. Dos Palos, and Firebaugh. The largest city impacted is Sacramento. It is a mandate put in place in 2007 via Senate Bill 7.
-Written by Manteca Bulletin opinion editor Dennis Wyatt.​