A collection of top water news from around California and the West compiled each weekday. Send any comments or article submissions to Foundation News & Publications Director Vik Jolly.
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Officials in multiple cities across the United States in recent
months have warned citizens about scams targeting water systems
that involve payments to improve so-called quality issues and
provide adequate testing. … A similar situation happened
in February in Fairfield, California, where a female homeowner
said that a strange man and woman showed up on her porch
requesting to come into her home. “He says, ‘What we’re doing
in the neighborhood is we’re checking the 94533 ZIP codes,
which your water is contaminated.’ I said, ‘What do you mean,
contaminated?’” Fairfield resident Martha Andrade told local
NBC affiliate KCRA. … In December, residents of Santa
Maria, California, reported to local officials that scam
artists were in their neighborhoods selling water treatment
units—telling homeowners that the costs associated with the
units would be reimbursed by the city, according to local NBC
affiliate KSBY.
Over the last three years, the Colorado River Basin has
experienced three relatively healthy winters. But that
decent snowpack, after melting, hasn’t filled reservoirs like
Lake Mead and Lake Powell as much as water users across the
West might like, due to years of drought and
overuse. Recent forecasts show Lake Mead and Lake Powell
will remain roughly one-third full after snow melts down from
the mountains across the West into the Colorado River and its
tributaries this year. … This year’s lackluster
forecasted runoff into Lake Powell coincides with tense
political negotiations between the seven states that use
Colorado River water: Arizona, California, Colorado, Nevada,
New Mexico, Utah and Wyoming.
Other water supply and snowpack news around the West:
The secretary of commerce is personally reviewing all contracts
with commitments above $100,000 at the National Oceanic and
Atmospheric Administration, causing backups and uncertainty in
the agency that is responsible for the country’s weather
forecasts, marine fisheries management and coastal management.
NOAA is housed within the Department of Commerce. Howard
Lutnick is reviewing all NOAA contracts above $100,000,
according to three agency employees who spoke anonymously out
of fear of retribution at work. There are hundreds of such
contracts across the agency that need to be reviewed each year
and several that have been paused or otherwise impacted by the
secretary’s review, according to an agency employee familiar
with the contracting process.
Faced with the rapid spread of golden mussels across California
waterways, state and federal officials are imposing strict new
measures at Folsom Lake and Lake Clementine to prevent the
invasive species from taking hold. Beginning Monday, all
trailered or motorized boats at the two popular Sacramento-area
lakes will be required to undergo inspection and a mandatory
30-day quarantine before launching. Golden mussels, native
to Asia, were first detected in California waters last fall in
the Port of Stockton. Since then, they have spread rapidly
through connected waterways, reaching as far south as
Bakersfield. Officials warn that the freshwater mollusks
threaten California’s water infrastructure, power systems and
aquatic ecosystems by clogging pipes, outcompeting native
species and damaging boats by attaching to hulls and clogging
engines.
NEARLY SOLD OUT! Our Central Valley Tour travels
the length of the San Joaquin Valley where water supply and use
have been in the national headlines, including our first
stop at San Luis Reservoir near Los Banos. Register
here before
tickets are gone! Can’t join our Central Valley Tour? You
can still learn about the Central Valley’s water resourcehs
with our array of educational guides and maps. And join us May 1 for
our annual open
house and reception at our office near the
Sacramento River!
A tiny water district in western Tulare County is poised to
nearly triple in size by annexing 13,000 acres of land that has
become “the stepchild nobody wants” for its lack of surface
water. The Atwell Island Water District, at 7,300 acres, sought
the annexation in order to help farmers in the area get access
to surface water, said board member Deanna Jackson. Atwell
has a small federal contract for water from the Central Valley
Project and is a subcontractor for water from the Cross Valley
Canal in Kern County as well. Jackson also runs the overarching
Tri-County Water Authority Groundwater Sustainability Agency,
tasked with bringing the region’s aquifers into balance per the
Sustainable Groundwater Management Act (SGMA). Atwell is a
member agency of Tri-County, which also brought this acreage
into its boundaries.
“Safe drinking water,” “greenhouse gas emissions,” and “climate
change” are just a few of the 100+ words and phrases now banned
at the Department of Agriculture’s research division, according
to a recently-leaked memo. More Perfect Union reports that in
March, staff at the USDA’s Agricultural Research Service (ARS)
were sent a long list of words and phrases by a section head
and told that they may no longer use any of them in certain
official contexts. The memo was sent by Sharon Strickland, the
Northeast Area Financial Management, Travel and Agreements
Section Head at the ARS, to staff. The ARS is the research wing
of the USDA, overseeing over 600 research projects and 2,000
scientists.
Since the 1950s, California’s salmon populations have dwindled
due to lost habitat from a combination of factors, including
human-made barriers such as dams, altered river flows, and
climate change. These challenges mean DWR looks for
opportunities to support salmon and other endangered species in
its projects whenever possible. DWR’s Lower Elkhorn Basin Levee
Setback (LEBLS) Project is a multi-benefit project where
engineering, flood protection, and supporting nature all come
together. While the primary goal of LEBLS is to reduce flood
risk, the recently expanded bypass floodplain is producing
zooplankton, an energy-rich invertebrate that’s a key part of
the juvenile salmon diet. This food production is happening in
significant quantities and sooner-than-expected.
Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham on Tuesday signed into law four
bills she said better prepares New Mexico to address: water
shortages from climate change; contamination from so-called
“forever chemicals;” and pollution in the state’s waters. …
“When you talk about water to anyone, it’s typically not a
dialogue, it’s a debate, because water is life,” Lujan Grisham
said during the bill signing, adding that the Legislature and
her office “did about three decades worth of work” on the issue
over the session. New Mexico Environment Secretary James Kenney
called the four bills “a big, bold package” for the
environment.
The Arizona Department of Water Resources (ADWR) has been
tasked with developing a model which will enable staff to
determine just how much water is in all the nooks and crannies
of the Willcox basin and others around the state. Rep. Gail
Griffin (R–LD14) tasked the agency, which oversees water issues
within the various basins in the state, to prepare a report so
legislators can make more informed decisions before making
rural groundwater policies, she stated. “Are groundwater levels
decreasing in certain basins? Yes, but the first step should be
to stop the bleeding to prevent the rate of decline from
getting worse. Then we can develop tools to help stabilize the
aquifer and find ways to put more water back in the basin, such
as groundwater recharge, reuse and new technology for farming,”
she stated.
… Just 100 miles northwest of Los Angeles, in California’s
Cuyama Valley, an exploratory oil drilling project is moving
forward on Harvard’s 6,565-acre vineyard. This project is the
latest in a series of Harvard’s grabs on natural resources in
the region that have worsened a critical drought of groundwater
and endangered the area’s many local farmers and ranchers. To
repair these harms, the University must, to the extent that it
is able, put an end to extractive groundwater pumping and oil
drilling in the area and instead invest in building sustainable
agricultural practices that prioritize — rather than threaten —
a human right to water. … From 2012 to 2018, Harvard
purchased thousands of acres of arable land across California.
Of these holdings, North Fork Ranch, acquired through the
subsidiary company Brodiaea Inc., has been the subject of
particular controversy. The land, historically a dry rangeland,
was transformed in a water-intensive process by Harvard into
the largest vineyard in the valley.
After more than ten years of meticulous planning and
collaboration among local landowners, government officials,
tribes and environmental scientists, the Redwood Creek Esturary
Restoration Project is finally gaining momentum. The U.S. Army
Corps of Engineers and Humboldt County officials will host a
public meeting at the Orick Community Hall at 4 p.m. on
Wednesday to discuss next steps for the estuary restoration
project, which aims to revitalize critical habitat for
threatened and endangered salmonid species in Redwood Creek.
… The restoration project would undo decades of
ecological degradation caused by the earthen levee system that
runs through the heart of Orick. Originally designed to control
flooding along the lower 3.4 miles of Redwood Creek, the levees
have “reduced the size, complexity, and ecological function of
the estuary,” according to the project’s description.
After years of struggling with poor water quality and aging
facilities, Governor Gavin Newsom today announced the
completion of a new water system for the City of Needles in
eastern San Bernardino County. This system will ensure reliable
access to safe drinking water for Needles’ 5,000 residents.
Today’s announcement of the new clean water system in Needles
furthers the state’s goal to provide all Californians with
clean and safe drinking water. Since 2019, thanks to state
efforts, the number of Californians without safe drinking water
has been reduced by half, from 1.6 million to about 800,000
people.
After decades of efforts to remove dams on the Klamath River
near the California-Oregon border, the project was completed
last year. It was the largest dam removal project in U.S.
history and, as the Associated Press reported, the removal was
a victory for tribes in the region who had fought to free the
river from four hydroelectric dams which, advocates said, had
contributed to environmental damage, including disrupting the
life cycle of salmon in the region. … A special episode
of OPB’s “Oregon Field Guide” series, titled “Klamath: After
the Dams,” will explore issues that exist in the wake of the
dam removal, including challenges to repair salmon habitat,
dealing with water shortages, and other conflicts.
When wildfires swept through Los Angeles in 2025, the flames
revealed more than just scorched communities and hillsides —
they exposed the increasing intersection between wildfire risk
and urban water infrastructure. In response, UCLA’s Climate &
Wildfire Research Initiative has launched the Urban Water
Supply + Fire working group to tackle this issue head-on. Led
by the UCLA Luskin Center for Innovation (LCI) in partnership
with the UC Agriculture and Natural Resources’ California
Institute for Water Resources, the working group will serve as
a research and policy coordination network focused on
developing research and policy solutions to challenges related
to water supply infrastructure, resilience, and post-fire
recovery.
Nearly all of California’s major reservoirs are fuller than
they were in previous years after a wet and stormy
winter. … The state’s largest reservoir, Lake Shasta, is
at 92% capacity as of Sunday, which amounts to 115% of its
historical capacity for this time of year, according to data
from the California Department of Water Resources. The lake is
at a surface elevation of 1,055 feet, according to data
from the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation, a continuation of rising
water levels since the holiday season’s heavy downpours.
(Shasta Lake is considered full at 1,067 feet, according to
Lakes Online, a website that records lake data.) The season’s
rains also have filled California’s other large reservoirs,
including Lake Oroville and Trinity Lake, which are now at at
90% and 87% capacity, respectively. If Oroville surpasses 100%,
it would be the third straight year the reservoir has hit
capacity.
Other water supply and snowpack news around the West:
The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services will be
reconvening an independent panel of health experts to make a
new recommendation on putting fluoride in drinking water, a
spokesperson said on Monday. The use of the mineral, which is
added to water to strengthen tooth enamel and promote dental
health, has been a hot-button political issue in some states
for decades. ”HHS is reconvening the Community Preventive
Services Task Force to study and make a new recommendation on
fluoride,” an HHS spokesperson said. The statement
followed an Associated Press report quoting Secretary of Health
and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy Jr. saying at an event in
Salt Lake City, Utah, that he plans to tell the Centers for
Disease Control and Prevention to stop recommending fluoride in
drinking water.
… The latest Trends Report from the California ASFMRA (American
Society of Farm Managers and Rural Appraisers) reveals a
significant correction in land values due largely to SGMA,
though land values in some cases did not seem to be following
as quickly with what some said was coming. … For the San
Joaquin Valley, where the northern region enjoys more ample
water supplies than other parts of the valley, even there,
farmland values have declined
significantly. … Conservative estimates suggest that
$17 billion of value in irrigated lands alone has been erased
from financial ledgers, according to Scott Bozzo, an accredited
farm manager with Macotera Ag Group from Lodi,
California. … California’s most valuable agricultural
county by gross output continues to be Kern. … The
highest agricultural land values in Kern County remain in the
river districts or where districts have done a good job
managing groundwater.
The United States is holding back water payments to Mexico in
order to send a message, the U.S. International Boundary and
Water Commissioner told Border Report. “The first action
that the State Department has done is in denying water
deliveries to Mexico in the Tijuana area,” U.S. IBWC
Commissioner Maria-Elena Giner told Border Report last
week. Under a 1944 international treaty, Mexico is
supposed to send 1.75 million acre-feet of water to the United
States via the Rio Grande over five-year
cycles. … The United States, likewise, under the
treaty is required to send to Mexico 1.5 million acre-feet of
water from the Colorado River. But Giner says requested
deliveries to Tijuana, Mexico, south of San Diego, were not
recently fulfilled. And she says more holding back of water,
and other resources, could come next if Mexico fails to send
the U.S. water.
As California continues to recover from devastating January
wildfires and extreme dryness that reached deep into winter,
there are early signs that the state and surrounding region
could face a troubling fire season in the months
ahead. The rainy season in the West is winding down, but
much of the region remains well behind on rainfall. The
Southwest is in deep drought after largely missing out on
storms this winter. Much of the broader West is forecast to
have unusually hot and dry weather in the coming weeks and
months. And that heat — along with the recent proliferation of
additional fire-fueling vegetation — could accelerate the
turnaround into yet another wildfire season, with high risks of
concerning conflagrations even for areas that had adequate rain
and snow this winter.
