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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… As extreme weather intensifies, securing and sustainably
managing water resources will be critical to mitigating the
impacts of prolonged drought, wildfire and flooding. That’s why
business leaders are tapping in, with corporate stewardship
activities aimed at helping secure California’s water future.
We have come together under the California Water Resilience
Initiative, managed by the Pacific Institute, to accelerate
collective action across sectors. As part of the Water
Resilience Coalition, a global effort to mobilize corporate
water stewardship, the California Water Resilience Initiative
has a unique opportunity to lead both nationally and globally,
defining the playbook for how businesses, government and
non-profits can help build water resilience at scale. –Written by Emilio Tenuta, senior vice president and chief
sustainability officer of Ecolab, and Jason Morrison, president
of the Pacific Institute and head of the CEO Water
Mandate.
Every year, billions of gallons of sewage and toxic industrial
waste flow down the Tijuana River, across the U.S.-Mexico
border, and into the Pacific Ocean. It is a complex,
decades-old, transjurisdictional issue that environmentalists
and governments at the local, state, and federal level have
been grappling with for years. Recently, entities on both sides
of the border have made some progress, but experts agree that
more has to be done to address the international pollution
crisis. But viewers watching Fox News would have scant
understanding of the complexity of this issue, the shared
responsibility for its resolution, or the progress that has
been made in both the U.S. and Mexico. According to Fox and new
EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin, the issue is simple: Mexico is to
blame.
The Klamath River Fund, a program of Humboldt Area Foundation
and Wild Rivers Community Foundation (HAF+WRCF), today
announced $1.2 million in grants awarded to 12
organizations working across the Klamath Basin. These
grants mark a significant step in the Fund’s 10-year commitment
to invest in and amplify community-led climate resilience and
restorative justice efforts following the unprecedented removal
of four dams on the Klamath River in 2023 and 2024.
… The grants invest in a wide range of organizations and
projects including sustainable agriculture along the Sprague
River at the Klamath’s headwaters in Oregon to the first effort
to boat the length of the un-dammed Klamath by local Tribal
youth.
The Imperial Irrigation District and its partners, the
California Department of Water Resources (DWR) and California
Project WET (Water Education Today), hosted a climate change
and water workshop for educators, Saturday, May 3, in IID’s
Condit Auditorium. Teachers working with students in
grades 3-12 attended to learn how climate change is allegedly
linked to floods, droughts, and water quality. Educators
learned how the changing climate may impact California’s water
resources, and Imperial Valley’s water in particular. They also
discussed activities to help students understand how they can
adapt to the region’s changing environment.
In a May 2, 2025, letter to Appropriations Committee Chair
Susan Collins, President Donald Trump’s FY2026 budget proposal
amounts to $4.2 billion in total funding reduction in 2026
compared to 2025 for the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency
(EPA). Clean and Drinking Water State Revolving Loan programs
would see the greatest reduction with an overall budget of $305
million. That amounts to $2.46 billion less than the 2025
budget. The President’s letter claims this change will place
the onus on states to fund their own infrastructure while
sharing additional reasoning as to why the reduction is on the
table.
Other water, environment and
agriculture funding news:
In a major change of plans aimed at rescuing California’s
struggling salmon populations, state wildlife officials have
done something never tried before: releasing millions of young
hatchery-raised Chinook salmon directly into the main stem of
the Sacramento River. This historic release of roughly 3.5
million juvenile fall-run Chinook salmon happened in mid-April
near Redding and Butte City. Typically, hatchery fish are
released into the rivers where their hatcheries are located,
like the Feather or Mokelumne Rivers. … This unprecedented
move comes as fall-run Chinook salmon numbers in the main
Sacramento River – the historical heart of California’s salmon
fishery – are at critically low levels.
A decade after the Sustainable Groundwater Management Act
became law, many California farmers still feel lost in the
bureaucracy surrounding its implementation. A new study finds
that, despite widespread awareness, real engagement remains
low. According to research from CSU-WATER — an initiative
encompassing 23 California State University campuses —
significant logistical and representational barriers have
prevented farmers from meaningfully engaging with their
Groundwater Sustainability Agencies. The research is part
of SGMA WAVE — short for Water and Valley Economy — a project
led by CSU-WATER, a water policy initiative involving all 23
CSU campuses. The study focuses on 72 GSAs across the San
Joaquin Valley counties of Madera, Fresno, Tulare, Kings, and
Kern.
With the recent discovery of invasive golden mussels in
California waterways, the Department of Water Resources (DWR)
is ramping up prevention efforts to protect Lake Oroville and
surrounding State Water Project (SWP) facilities. Golden
mussels haven’t been detected in Lake Oroville, Thermalito
Forebay, or Thermalito Afterbay, but DWR is taking proactive
steps to keep it that way. These invasive mussels can severely
damage ecosystems, clog pipelines, foul boat motors, and
disrupt water delivery systems. To stop their spread, DWR is
partnering with California State Parks and California
Department of Fish and Wildlife to implement a mandatory
watercraft inspection program at Lake Oroville starting later
this month.
In November 2024, powerful gusts whipped across parts of the
Central Valley. The winds not only knocked out power, but they
also kicked up soil particles, producing a massive dust storm.
The extreme weather event dropped visibility to near zero,
grinding highway traffic to a halt. Scientists expect dust
storms in California to occur even more often in the future,
due to climate change and human activities like construction
and agriculture. … The Sustainable
Groundwater Management Act may have also increased the
chances for dust storms. The act, passed in 2014, limits the
overdraft of groundwater in order protect groundwater basins in
the long term. It has caused farmers to take some fields out of
production due to decreased water access.
… With the rapid rollbacks taking place across the federal
government showing no signs of decelerating, many environmental
groups have expressed concern that regulations safeguarding
against PFAS contamination could soon be weakened or
overturned. As a result of the unclear future of federal
regulation, as well as the prevalence of PFAS in drinking
water, many states have taken it upon themselves to strengthen
their PFAS laws to protect their waterways. … One such
example was seen in California, where state
legislators introduced Assembly Bill 794 aiming to strengthen
the State Water Board’s authority by empowering the Water Board
to directly combat challenges to the existing federal
regulation by ordering it to “establish emergency regulations
that are at least as protective as current federal standards”
(as of January 19, 2025).
This article documents the current status of tribal water
rights
in California and explains why they differ from other
states. … In 1908, the U.S. Supreme Court affirmed in
Winters v. U.S. that through the creation of reservations,
tribes are entitled to water rights sufficient to meet their
homeland needs. … The Klamath Tribes in Oregon, the
Pyramid Lake Paiute Tribe (PLPT) in Nevada, and five
reservations along the California-Arizona border hold
high-priority Winters rights to surface water crossing the
California state line. In each case, the sovereignty tribes
were able to exert over their rights increased when tribal
priorities aligned with state or federal interests.
… Across Colorado, the snowpack peaked lower in major river
basins than the 30-year median, according to federal data from
1991 to 2020. The peaks were often earlier than usual, and the
snowpack is melting quickly — several weeks earlier than the
norm in some areas. Water managers and climatologists are
hoping for a rainy May and active summer thunderstorm season.
In dry years, farmers and ranchers can be short on irrigation
water in late summer. Reservoirs can have less extra water to
carry over into the next year. Fish and aquatic ecosystems can
suffer with less water in warmer rivers. Water managers across
the desert Southwest are in similar situations. Western
Colorado is a key water source for the Colorado River
Basin, where rivers and streams send water into an
immense reservoir, Lake Powell.
Along the Pacific Northwest coast, scientists have long warned
of a looming threat: a massive earthquake from the Cascadia
Subduction Zone, capable of triggering tsunamis and devastating
shaking. Now, new research highlights another, often-overlooked
danger—the sudden sinking of the land itself and the
longer-term threats posed by coastal flooding. A study
authored by a team of scientists including USGS shows that a
magnitude 8 or greater earthquake today along the Cascadia
megathrust fault—stretching from northern California to
Vancouver Island, British Columbia—could cause 0.5 to 2 meters
(1.6 to 6.6 feet) of sudden land subsidence, instantly raising
relative local sea levels and more than doubling the number of
people, buildings, and roads exposed to coastal flooding.
The Los Osos water pipeline has been in the works for the past
four years. If funded, it would connect Los Osos to the state
water project, providing the town with a new source of water.
The project has already been approved at the federal level, but
for work to begin, the Army Corps of Engineers needs to approve
the allocation of funds. A recent report from the Los Osos
Community Services District’s general manager states the CSD
has reached out to the Corps several times since December for
an update on the project but has never received a
response.
The Rio Linda/Elverta Community Water District (RLECWD), has
reached a major settlement in its long-running lawsuit against
the U.S. government over potential groundwater contamination
stemming from the former McClellan Air Force Base. The $6.25
million agreement, officially approved by the U.S. District
Court on February 18, 2025, resolves the District’s claims
under federal environmental laws. After accounting for legal
fees, the District received $4.09 million from the settlement
on March 12th. … Early news reports suggested the
District, along with Sacramento Suburban Water District in a
similar case, was initially seeking much larger sums,
potentially over a billion dollars, to address the
contamination concerns.
A nearly half-mile segment of coastline in Huntington Beach and
Newport Beach at the Talbert Channel reopened to surfers and
swimmers Monday morning after a large sewage spill caused a
weekend cessation of water activity. Orange County Health Care
Agency officials on Saturday called for the temporary closure
along beaches 1,000 feet to the north and south of the channel,
near the mouth of the Santa Ana River, to protect visitors from
potential exposure to bacteria. The spill stemmed from a
blockage discovered Friday evening in a sewer line on Costa
Mesa’s Mesa Verde Drive East, near Golf Course Drive, according
to Scott Carroll, general manager of Costa Mesa Sanitary
District.
Few developments in local history have changed the Valley more
than Friant Dam. From providing flood control and irrigation
water to the east side of the Valley, to drying up huge
portions of the river, and destroying the salmon population,
the scale of the dam’s impact is undeniable. Today on KVPR’s
Central Valley Roots, we explore the dam’s history. California
leaders originally envisioned the Central Valley Project as a
state funded effort as early as 1919. But amid the Great
Depression, the state couldn’t sell the bonds necessary to fund
construction. Instead the state turned to Washington. In 1935
President Franklin Delano Roosevelt approved the construction
of Friant Dam.
… Many experts are calling for a collective reframing of
water as a scarce and essential common good.
… Extraction rights and pricing systems that fail to
account for the hidden effects (or ‘externalities’) that come
from using this common good lead to inefficient consumption and
can direct water-intensive activities to regions that are
already water-stressed. … Better pricing through targeted
water-use taxes and subsidies could help to manage demand,
improve access and support more sustainable use. For example,
chip manufacturers like Intel and TSMC have invested in
building semiconductor factories (or ‘fabs’) in Arizona – a
state known for its dry climate. … Better pricing could
have given these companies the incentives to locate their
facilitates in more water-abundant regions, easing pressure on
Arizona’s water system.
Beside a restored creek in San Geronimo, California, birds soar
where birdies once were scored. Formerly home to an 18-hole
golf course, the 157-acre property has been rewilded into a
thriving nature preserve. The fairway, once groomed to
unnatural perfection, is now overgrown with tall grass and
wildflowers. … Vitally, the creek that runs through the
course’s front nine – no longer impeded by a dam – is seeing a
slow return of the endangered coho salmon. … With the
number of golf course closures outweighing openings every year
since 2006, some are rethinking the best use of these open
spaces. In states such as Florida, Ohio, Massachusetts,
and California, nature is now being allowed to run its course
to protect wildlife and protect against storms.
Some residents in San Diego neighborhoods including Pacific
Beach and La Jolla told CBS 8 that they have recently picked up
on a strong chlorine flavor and questioned what was happening.
… Working for you, CBS 8 reached out to the City of San
Diego to find out what’s causing the smell and taste. According
to the city, chlorine is a standard and essential part of
treating drinking water. It’s used as a disinfectant and is
regularly added to water stored in local reservoirs, which are
monitored weekly. … After a recent inspection, the city
added more chlorine to the Bay View reservoir to ensure water
quality. Some residents served by the reservoir, including in
Pacific Beach, La Jolla and Soledad, may have temporarily
noticed a stronger taste or smell.
