Today Californians face increased risks from flooding, water
shortages, unhealthy water quality, ecosystem decline and
infrastructure degradation. Many federal and state legislative
acts address ways to improve water resource management, ecosystem
restoration, as well as water rights settlements and strategies
to oversee groundwater and surface water.
It seems that every time there’s a proposal in the Legislature
to help repair the Friant-Kern Canal, something goes wrong. It
happened again last month. Senate Bill 559 would have
directed state money toward repairing the Friant-Kern Canal,
Delta-Mendota Canal and the California Aqueduct, which are
sinking due to land subsidence. The damage is hurting their
ability to move water. But the bill got tripped up in the
Assembly.
On Thursday, October 7, 2021, Governor Newsom signed Senate
Bill 821, which mandates that members of the Delta Independent
Science Board shall not be employees of the Delta Stewardship
Council, and that the Council shall issue contracts to pay the
Delta Independent Science Board members at professional
scientific rates. The Governor’s signing of SB 821 ends an
embarrassing chapter in the state’s administration of the Delta
Independent Science Board.
Governor Newsom has signed Assembly Bill 36 authored by
Assemblyman Gallagher (R-Yuba City) and co-authored by Senator
Nielsen (R-Tehama). The legislation helps fast-track
construction of the Paradise Irrigation District (PID) water
intertie and the Paradise sewer project, and is supported by
the Town of Paradise, the Paradise Irrigation District and the
State Building and Construction Trades Council of
California.
We also learned last week of two new ballot measures for the
2020 ballot … The first proposal would ban collective
bargaining for government workers. The second measure would
require 2 percent of the state’s general-fund revenue each year
to fund water projects until the state amasses an additional 5
million acre-feet of available water supplies. -Written by Steven Greenhut, Western region director
for the R Street Institute and a member of the Southern
California News Group editorial board.
The water wars continue. Not surprisingly on Friday President
Joe Biden’s administration took action to essentially place on
hold an action taken by former President Donald Trump in early
2020 designed to ensure more water would be delivered to the
Central Valley. The issue involved is biological opinions
issued in 2019 by the Trump administration to be used when it
comes to how water is managed. But a letter issued by the
Bureau of Reclamation stated new biological opinions were
anticipated. So not surprisingly California Republicans in
Congress criticized Biden’s action.
A new bill authored by state Sen. John Laird and Assemblymember
Robert Rivas will fund all of the state’s share of the design
and construction phase of the Pajaro River Flood Risk
Management Project, which will help move forward the
long-awaited work. SB 496 directs the Department of Water
Resources to pay 100% of the State’s cost-share for
reconstruction—a total of $140 million—of the Pajaro River
Flood Risk Management Project. Gov. Newsom signed the bill
on Sept. 24.
On September 28, 2021, the state of California (through the
Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment) held a
virtual workshop for proposed Public Health Goals (PHGs) for
two types of PFAS – PFOA and PFOS. The release of proposed PHGs
is extremely significant for any company situated in
California, as PHGs are used to create enforceable drinking
water standards and limits for groundwater contamination.
Congress passed a government funding bill in a down-to-the-wire
vote on Thursday in the face of a looming shutdown. The
continuing resolution bill, a short-term spending resolution
that will keep the government funded through early December,
delegates $28.6 billion to disaster relief efforts, including
for wildfire prevention and response and the consequences of
drought. Here’s some of what the bill addresses on wildfires
and drought.
The first year of the 2021-22 legislative session recently
concluded and the Legislature and the Governor took significant
action on various elements to support and provide robust
funding for Ridgetop to river mouth water management, including
the immense benefits of Healthy Forests, Reactivating
Floodplains, Sustainable Groundwater Management, Vital Rivers
and Streams, and Healthy Soils and Farms, and Safe Drinking
Water.
The State Department of Water Resources will bolster funding
the long-anticipated Pajaro River levee system rebuild after
Gov. Gavin Newsom signed Senate Bill 496 on Friday — a move
critical in protecting residents from frequent floods,
officials say. The levees — built in 1949 — haven’t stacked up
to heavy rainfall events. For Pajaro Valley residents and
farmers it’s been a decades-long saga of evacuations, property
damage, and safety risks. In 1995 the river flooded, killing
two people, and leaving more than $95 million in damages in its
wake.
Two decades ago, California agencies joined federal agencies in
signing the CALFED Record of Decision, which committed to a
world class Delta science program. A key part of that
commitment was to establish an Independent Science Board to
provide oversight and peer review of the overall program. In
2009, the legislature established the Delta Independent Science
Board as a replacement for the CALFED Independent Science
Board. … The Governor has yet to take action on the bill
…
The House last month voted for a Sept. 27 deadline to bring the
bipartisan infrastructure plan to the floor. On Sunday, Pelosi
didn’t specify when this week it would be voted on.
… Along with the infrastructure bill, Democratic
leadership is also hoping to push through the $3.5
trillion social spending package this week, in part to
retain the support of progressives who might otherwise not vote
for the infrastructure bill.
State drinking water officials have quietly targeted a dozen
small, disadvantaged water systems in Fresno for possible state
aid. But it could still take up to three years to get through
the paperwork and start putting pipes in the ground. … The
State Water Resources Control Board commissioned a feasibility
study through Fresno State University’s California Water
Institute to get a first glimpse of what it would take to have
the small systems folded into the City of Fresno’s much larger
drinking water system.
The Great Salt Lake hit a record low this year, but it’s not
the only salty lake that’s drying up. Utah Rep. Blake Moore, a
Republican, teamed up with California’s Rep. Jared Huffman to
introduce the “Saline Lake Ecosystems in the Great Basin States
Program Act” last week. The bipartisan legislation … would
authorize $25 million over five years for the program, during a
critical period where climate change is accelerating their
decline….Moore’s bill would also attempt to rescue saline
waters such as Oregon’s Lake Albert, Nevada’s Lahontan Wetlands
and California’s Salton Sea and Mono Lake.
The Central Valley is a special place to live. Friday night
football games. Hiking in world-famous parks. The best food
anywhere in the world, grown just next door. But right now, so
much of what makes our Valley great is in jeopardy, and all you
have to do is walk outside and take a breath to feel it. These
massive wildfires and the smoke they create mixed with the
terrible drought we’re in right now means everything from
football to hiking to planting a year’s worth of crops is
teetering on the edge of impossible. -Written by Congressman Josh Harder.
As California trudges into another autumn marred by toxic
wildfire smoke and drought-parched reservoirs, state lawmakers
have cast climate change as a growing public health threat for
the state’s 40 million residents. But they were willing to
push the argument only so far. … Lawmakers failed to
pass legislation to more quickly and aggressively reduce the
state’s share of the greenhouse gas emissions warming the
planet.
A challenge to new or increased California water or sewer rates
must be brought within 120 days pursuant to Senate
Bill 323, which was signed into law this week. SB 323
applies to rates for both retail and wholesale water and sewer
fees adopted or increased after January 1, 2022. How will this
impact local agencies across the state?
Wetlands management and related federal permitting is changing
–AGAIN. If you or your organization seek wetlands or related
permitting, then the latest changes in for “navigable waters”
impact both regulators and the regulated community – and may
change your approach. Projects that impact “Waters of the
United States” (WOTUS) under the Clean Water Act (CWA) from the
Army Corps, Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), and states
administering CWA permitting programs should look closely at
these changes.
Today local lawmakers toured the Kern Water Bank to see drought
impact firsthand. $50 million from the state budget is going to
fund Assembly Bill 252, which calls for land repurposing all to
focus on the drought and getting water flow back to where it
matters. … Farmers are faced with the harsh reality of
choosing to grow a crop on land that may not have enough water
to maintain it or keeping up fallow land that will sit empty
for the crop season.
Billions of dollars that could cover the loss of burned vines
and smoke-tainted wine grapes. Hundreds of millions to help
with drought, and hundreds of millions more for hazardous fuels
management. The House on Tuesday passed a nearly $30 billion
disaster relief package that could be a godsend to Northern
California’s wildfire-ravaged and drought-stricken communities.
But in classic Washington fashion, there’s a catch — the money
is tied up in a partisan game of chicken.
From California to West Virginia, efforts are underway to
conserve and restore fish and wildlife migration corridors and
habitat. … Constructed in 1947, the Matilija Dam on the
Ventura River no longer serves its original purpose: water
storage and flood control. The reservoir is almost filled with
sediment, blocks fish migration, and contributes to beach
erosion. Since 1999, the Ventura County Public Works
Agency has engaged in a multi-stakeholder effort to remove the
dam from Matilija Creek.
With the House of Representatives back in session, we are
pleased that one of the first items on its agenda will be
consideration of the bipartisan infrastructure bill approved by
the Senate last month. We hope our congressional
representatives used their summer break to experience firsthand
the desperate situation all Californians face. Wildfires
threaten communities, homes and lives; devastating drought is
hurting businesses, the environment and the farms Californians
count on to grow healthy food. -Written by Dan
Errotabere, a farmer in the San Joaquin Valley town of
Riverdale, and John Monroe, who farms near the town of
Arbuckle in the Sacramento Valley.
The changing climate is everywhere Gustavo Carranza looks when
he walks through his undulating citrus farm here in this tiny
town in the foothills of the Sierra Nevada. The summer
temperatures are consistently higher than they used to be. The
smoke from nearby wildfires fills the sky, obscuring the sun
and speckling his mandarin trees with delicate ash. And, most
concerning, the water he needs to run his 150-acre farm has
become so scarce …
Following months of hydrologic saber-rattling, Fresno lawmakers
voted 4-2 to sue Friant Water Authority over a request for
payment to fund repairs to the Friant-Kern Canal in the south
Valley. The legal brinkmanship, which centers on a relatively
small sum – roughly $2.5 million, could have far-reaching
consequences by putting the water supply of California’s
fifth-largest city in jeopardy. During Thursday’s Fresno
City Council meeting, Fresno City Attorney Doug Sloan announced
the body voted to approve litigation seeking declaratory relief
from the cost-sharing measure proposal to fund subsidence
repairs.
After much wrangling over how lost farmland could be used for
other purposes — and what purposes they could be — growers who
lose farmland should now have a chance to receive the help they
need to use their land for other plans. The end result is a
bill that has passed the state legislature that keeps much of
the provisions of the original bill and also contains $50
million to help farmers use lost farmland for other purposes.
Congressional Democrats are moving toward enacting two measures
that could vastly expand access to flood insurance and give
communities a more accurate picture of their flood risk through
better maps. Two provisions in a budget reconciliation bill the
House Financial Services Committee approved Tuesday address
long-standing shortcomings in flood protection as climate
change and coastal development intensify damage from
flooding.
Four LA Sanitation and Environment stormwater capture projects
were approved for funding on Wednesday, Sept. 15, by the Los
Angeles County Board of Supervisors. The board approved
the projects for a total of $50.7 million in funding through
the Los Angeles County Safe Clean Water 2021-22 Regional
Program, which is financed by revenues from Measure W, the
parcel tax measure approved by voters in 2018 for projects
increasing the water supply, improve water quality, protect
public health and provide community enhancements.
Here we go again. We are being told California water supplies
are at risk and we need to start using less water under threat
of more mandatory water use restrictions. In 2019, we had one
of the wettest years on record. At the end of the 2019 water
year, major water storage reservoirs in California were at 125%
of average capacity. That was just two years ago. In 2019,
California had enough rainfall and snow pack to satisfy several
years of water supply demands if we had dams and reservoirs of
sufficient capacity to capture this life-giving resource. -Written by Steven Smith, Village News contributor.
The Valley’s best hope to renovate its water infrastructure has
been put on the shelf for now. Senate Bill (SB) 559, the State
Water Resiliency Act of 2021, was moved to the state Assembly’s
“inactive file” on Sept. 8. … As written SB 559 offered
a holisitic, statewide approach to help restore the conveyance
capacity by created a fund to provide up to $785 million to
repair key parts of the state’s water infrastructure.
Las Vegas visitors can still snap selfies with the mermaids
swimming among tropical fish in the Silverton Casino’s massive
aquarium and gaze at the colorful dancing water displays of the
iconic Bellagio fountains — for now. But southern Nevada and
much of the American West are struggling to cope with a
worsening drought that has strained municipal water supplies,
agricultural operations and wildlife populations.
This year, natural disasters across the country — including
epochal drought conditions and devastating wildfires in
California — have thrown into sharp relief the urgent need for
action on climate. Despite the urgency of the issue, proposed
legislation in the state to address climate change has either
been thwarted or diluted by the powerful fossil-fuel industry’s
allies and lobbyists. Overall, ten proposed bills that included
environmental justice measures, industry accountability and
emissions reduction programs never made it to a final chamber
in the state Senate or Assembly in the face of opposition from
the oil and gas industry.
A bill that would have created a program to help farmers find
new life for farmland idled by coming groundwater restrictions
had its own phoenix moment last week in the Legislature when it
was simultaneously killed and reborn — this time with
money. AB 252, authored by Assemblymembers Robert Rivas
(D-Salinas) and Rudy Salas (D-Bakersfield), died in the state
Senate last week but much of its content was reborn in a budget
bill with $50 million attached.
About 2,700 wells across the state are projected to go dry this
year. If the drought continues, 1,000 more will go dry next
year. In 2014, the California Legislature enacted a package of
new laws that aimed to stop groundwater over-pumping, but as
CalMatters’ Rachel Becker reports seven years later, little has
changed for Californians relying on drinking water wells.
Depletion of their groundwater continues. Pumping is largely
unrestricted, and there are few, if any, protections in place.
The California Legislature released the final budget language
late on the Sunday of Labor Day weekend. CalTrout remains
critical of the unnecessary delay in releasing critical budget
items like emergency drought funding, wildfire relief, and
climate resilience packages. As water curtailment orders go
live throughout the state, the legislature is still waiting to
officially approve these critical funding packages to combat
the effects of climate during this year’s especially dry
drought conditions.
The razorback sucker fish could be downlisted from an
endangered species to threatened in the next year or so,
according to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. This week,
environmental groups sent the agency a letter in opposition to
the move. The letter argues the razorback sucker is still in
trouble, despite recoveries it’s made in the last 30 years,
which is when it was first listed as federally endangered. The
fish is native to the Colorado River, which is facing historic
shortages due to the west’s megadrought.
A $1 trillion infrastructure bill that received bipartisan
support in the Senate last month includes billions of dollars
for Western water projects and programs. The Biden
administration has called the infrastructure bill, which
includes $8.3 billion for Western water infrastructure,
“the largest investment in the resilience of physical and
natural systems in American history.” Of the $8.3 billion
dedicated to Western water, $450 million is set aside for a
competitive grant program to fund large-scale projects that
advance water recycling….That program could help pay for
a massive recycling project in California that would
leave Nevada with access to more water in Lake Mead.
California lawmakers on Thursday voted to spend more than $2
billion to prevent wildfires and address a severe drought,
closing the book — for now — on a $262.5 billion operating
budget that began the year with a record deficit because of the
pandemic and ended with a record surplus in spite of it.
Wildfire spending in California has more than tripled since
2005, surpassing $3 billion last year. But most of that money
is spent on putting out fires, not preventing them.
President Theodore Roosevelt wanted to see quick action on the
new federal irrigation bill. Prior to 1902, private landowners
perfected water rights to the Truckee and Carson rivers in
accordance with Nevada law (“perfected” meaning that permitted
water satisfied the Beneficial Use requirement as described in
Part IV of the series). … The Bureau of
Reclamation’s strong hand and bold plans concerning the
appropriation of Lake Tahoe water and other California
hydrological resources for aggressive agricultural expansion in
Nevada (the driest state in the nation) enraged California’s
residents and politicians.
The major arteries of California’s water-delivery system are
crumbling, but a proposal in the state Legislature to spend
$785 million fixing them is dead for the year. The legislation,
SB 559 was pulled off the table this week by its chief author,
state Sen. Melissa Hurtado (D-Sanger), after an Assembly
committee stripped the funding and made other changes to the
legislation. Hurtado’s decision turns SB 559 into a two-year
bill that could be revived next year.
The California Legislature took an important step to protect
Californians from toxic, “forever” PFAS chemicals by passing
Assembly Bill 1200 (Ting) today. Having previously passed on
the Senate floor 36-0, the bill now goes to the
Governor. AB 1200 would help make our food and our
environment safer by banning the use of toxic, “forever” PFAS
chemicals in paper-based food packaging.
Ironic how a whitewater rafting trip can be a great analogy for
water policy work. Collaborating on water policy and water
solution implementations in California is a productive pathway
forward. Be it in a coalition, at your local farm, in your
community, in the Legislature, in the Governor’s office, or
when barreling towards rapids in a raft. Without collaboration,
particularly in a dry year like 2021, we all may fail for fish,
farmers, fowl, floodplains, and for safe drinking water.
The Bureau of Reclamation and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife
Service today announced the Notice of Funding Opportunity for
projects that enhance Chinook salmon and steelhead trout
production and associated habitats in the Central Valley,
consistent with the Central Valley Project Improvement Act.
Reclamation and the Service plan to award up to $40 million
(subject to appropriations) in fiscal year 2022 through
multiple grants or cooperative agreements to projects
prioritized by the CVPIA Near-Term Restoration Strategy.
There have been all kinds of efforts and money allocated to
trying to solve California’s water woes. Now an organization
states it has the solution — the 2 percent solution. In what
it’s calling the 2 percent solution More Water Now is working
to place an initiative on the November 2022 ballot that would
require 2 percent of the state budget to be allocated to the
state’s water resources. If placed on the ballot and approved
the water abundance ballot initiative would set aside 2 percent
of the state budget to water.
On August 30, 2021, the U.S. District Court for the District of
Arizona vacated the April 2020 Navigable Waters Protection Rule
in which the Trump Administration revised the definition of
Waters of the United States (WOTUS). The court is still
weighing whether (a) to restore the Obama-era WOTUS rule, which
more broadly defines jurisdictional areas; or (b) simply to
undo the Trump rollback, which would result in a return to
pre-Obama WOTUS regulations.
In January 1900, Nevada Congressman Francis Newlands sponsored
a measure for the federal government to provide water for
irrigation in arid regions throughout the western United
States. The bill ran into resistance from politicians concerned
about giving up state control of water to the federal
government, but ultimately the most contentious issues were
resolved and the law passed.
Last week, the State Water Board finally intervened in the
unincorporated area of Tooleville’s 20-year struggle to obtain
the basic human right to clean drinking water with a letter to
the city of Exeter and the Tooleville Mutual Nonprofit Water
Association, giving the two parties six months to hash out
terms for a voluntary consolidation of Tooleville to Exeter’s
water system or face a mandatory order with much less
cooperation.
Concerned that tens of millions of dollars promised to
help address woes at the Salton Sea could vanish
from this year’s state budget, a chorus of
Riverside and Imperial County officials this week wrote to
Gov. Gavin Newsom and California Natural Resources Secretary
Wade Crowfoot politely demanding that the funding stay on
track. … Residents in rural communities ringing the
rapidly shrinking water body suffer disproportionately high
asthma rates and other risks from dust released into the air as
the shoreline grows.
As part of its recently enacted budget for 2021-22, California
included funding to help foster the development of one such
storage method, known as pumped-storage hydropower. In
particular, the budget provided $18 million to the city of San
Diego and the San Diego County Water Authority for use in
advancing their planned joint project known as the San Vicente
Energy Storage Facility. The funding will enable the two
entities to issue a request for proposals in September for a
private partner willing to develop the project at its own
expense.
Like many farmers across California, Zack Andrade’s business is
being choked by an extraordinary two-year drought. Water cuts
could soon erase about a quarter of the irrigation he depends
on to grow leafy greens, carrots and beets on his family’s farm
in the rolling hills south of Silicon Valley, near Morgan
Hill. Andrade said the crisis has been made worse by
successive governors, including Gavin Newsom, who he says have
punted on damming rivers and building new reservoirs to help
California store more water during wet years.
There is hope that the unfortunate conditions of California’s
water supply this year will prompt decisive action on water
management and storage. President and CEO of Western Growers,
Dave Puglia noted that his conversations with growers have been
disheartening. There is significant concern that if California
gets another dry year, many farmers will not be able to
recover. The dire circumstances of the current water year
underscore the imperative need for an updated approach to water
management.
Right now, Congress is debating needed investments in our water
system decades in the making. While the Senate’s compromise
bill passed earlier this month includes billions for lead pipe
replacement and helping communities prepare for future drought
and floods, the bill falls short of ensuring all families can
turn their tap on and access safe, affordable water.
… Some utilities are stepping up to help (both San
Francisco Public Utilities and East Bay Municipal
Utilities District have customer assistance programs)
… -Written by Michael McAfee, president and CEO of
PolicyLink, a national research and action institute focused on
advancing racial and economic equity, and Susana De
Anda, co-founder and executive director of the Community
Water Center, a nonprofit environmental justice organization
based in California’s San Joaquin Valley.
In 2014, in the middle of a severe drought that would test
California’s complex water storage system like never before,
voters told the state to borrow $7.5 billion and use part of it
to build projects to stockpile more water. Seven years later,
that drought has come and gone, replaced by an even hotter and
drier one that is draining the state’s reservoirs at an
alarming rate. But none of the more than half-dozen water
storage projects scheduled to receive that money have been
built.
A federal judge Monday threw out a major Trump administration
rule that scaled back federal protections for streams, marshes
and wetlands across the United States, reversing one of the
previous administration’s most significant environmental
rollbacks. U.S. District Judge Rosemary Márquez wrote that
Trump officials committed serious errors while writing the
regulation, finalized last year, and that leaving it in place
could lead to “serious environmental harm.”
Expect legislation next winter in the Colorado General Assembly
that would seek to curb potential speculation in Colorado
water. But whether water speculation actually poses a problem
remains hotly debated. A report released Aug. 13 by a state
work group charged with studying how to strengthen Colorado
anti-water-speculation law identifies eight concepts to thwart
possible water hoarding that should be studied further. One
would eliminate or reduce the agricultural tax benefit for
lands from which water is removed following a water rights
purchase and transfer.
Assemblyman Chris Holden, D-Pasadena, partnered with a
coalition of community health experts Thursday, Aug. 26 to
garner support for a proposed law that would cut the legal
limit of lead leaching from plumbing fixtures for sale by more
than half. Lead is a highly toxic metal especially dangerous to
kids and youth whose body and brains are still growing. Even
low levels can stunt children’s physical, intellectual and
behavioral development, according to Alice Kuo, a professor of
Internal Medicine and Pediatrics at UCLA.
There was an unusual twist at Wednesday’s gubernatorial recall
debate in Sacramento: A Democrat participated for the first
time. And that Democrat, 29-year-old millionaire Ventura County
real estate investor Kevin Paffrath, jump-started the hour-long
debate with some unusual ideas. Paffrath, who has never held
elective office, proposed to solve California’s water shortages
by building a pipeline to the Mississippi River…. As
California falls deeper into an extraordinary drought, all
three GOP candidates threw shade on Newsom approach of
encouraging conservation. It was one of their most detailed
debate exchanges about water policy to date, yet yielded few
ideas for immediate action.
As climate-driven drought and wildfires rage in California, the
Biden administration is struggling to navigate the hard
politics that come with deciding who gets access to the state’s
precious — and dwindling — water supplies. … Now the Biden
administration is delaying action on the fundamental question
at the heart of California’s long-running water wars: How much
water should be reserved for species protections, at the
expense of the state’s powerful agricultural industry?
California Governor Gavin Newsom’s recall election in
mid-September, should he lose, will very likely terminate the
floundering politician’s career. A late-term gubernatorial
replacement would also mean a potentially major shift in
California environmental policies. … Budget spending
… could be directed away from hundreds of conservation
projects that are tentatively scheduled to begin, and directors
of wildlife, water, and resource agencies who were appointed by
Newsom would almost certainly be replaced.
California is generally known as an environmental leader, but
the state has also faced tremendous environmental degradation
and destruction. I chronicled my “top 10” worst environmental
decisions in the state’s history last year. But what about the
good things state policy makers have done? Here is my list of
the most significant environmental wins in California since the
state’s founding.
The front lawn came with the house we moved into a couple years
ago. The patch of Bermudagrass was smaller than an average
putting green and easy to mow. The splash of deep green was
cute as far as that goes, but it was out of place on a street
that had largely made the transition to colored rock and
water-smart landscaping. Beyond the postcard aesthetics, it
made zero sense to continue to water a lawn in the desert.
Setting aside the politics of climate change and our arid land
with its endless water crisis — a basic definition of “desert”
— there were no children at home to play on it. -Written by John L. Smith, an author and Nevada
Independent columnist.
EPA laid out a path for states and tribes to take more time to
negotiate and tackle challenges before signing off on water
permits — an attempt to defang a controversial Trump-era rule
that allows only a year to approve or deny permits for
utilities and oil and gas pipelines. Sources say the move is an
attempt by the Biden administration to mitigate the adverse
effects of the Trump water rule finalized last year that’s
still on the books while showing sensitivity to advocates
fighting the proliferation of fossil fuel projects.
Resources are available to help San Joaquin Valley residents
affected by drought maintain access to drinking water. A
group of organizations in the San Joaquin Valley coordinated by
the California Partnership for the San Joaquin Valley Water
Workgroup have developed an outreach plan and a list of
resources available to private well owners or part of a small
community who have lost or are concerned about losing access to
drinking water due to groundwater level.
Summer is underway and that means splashing around Putah Creek,
hiking, camping, and… heat domes? With this excessive heat, the
thought on everyone’s minds is likely how does this severe
drought affect water resources throughout California? The
extreme temperatures coupled with the low snowpack in the
Sierra have meant fast evaporation in many of the state’s
reservoirs; not to mention a heat dome that has descended upon
much of the United States bringing record breaking heat to even
the most mild summer climates.
Efforts to rid the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta of abandoned
boats received a boost when Assemblymember Jim Frazier, D-11,
secured a $12 million allocation for that purpose in the
state’s budget for fiscal year 2021 – 2022. The
allocation is specifically earmarked for the removal of
abandoned and derelict commercial vessels that litter the
Delta. These vessels have the potential to leak any number of
dangerous pollutants into the Delta, which is also the heart of
the water supply for two-thirds of all Californians.
California’s water infrastructure is decades old and
drastically needs to be fixed. Valley Senator Melissa Hurtado
just got water repair money from the Governor but it’s far less
than what she wanted. Senator Hurtado got $100-million
from Governor Newsom in her water bill. But it’s $685-million
short of what she was seeking. The money will go to four
water projects, the San Joaquin and San Luis Divisions of the
California Aqueduct, Delta-Mendota Canal and the Friant-Kern
Canal.
Not only does the Turlock-native Congressman refrain from
partisan politics for the most part, although those who don’t
understand why a Democrat would vote for Nancy Pelosi as House
Speaker as opposed to Kevin McCarthy will argue that point, but
Harder knows a drought when he sees one. The second term 10th
District congressman in late July noted that California is in
dire straits. Harder pointed out the reservoirs we rely on are
at a lower point now than they were at the depth of the last
drought that ended in 2019. -Written by Turlock Journal columnist Dennis
Wyatt.
With vast swaths of the West experiencing exceptional or
extreme drought conditions and more than 90 active wildfires, a
national coalition led by the California Farm Bureau has helped
secure Senate approval for major federal investments in
critical water projects. California Farm Bureau President Jamie
Johansson applauded the Senate’s passage of legislation to fund
$550 million in infrastructure spending over the next five
years. As drought conditions continue to worsen throughout the
West, he said, “now is the time to invest and make timely
improvements in our nation’s water management portfolio.”
With an increasing focus on the multiple benefits of healthy
soils, the Budget Act of 2021 recently appropriated $50 million
in one-time funding from the General Fund to the California
Department of Food and Agriculture (CDFA) for implementation of
the Healthy Soils Program and $40 million for State Water
Efficiency and Enhancement Program (SWEEP) to reduce greenhouse
gases and save water. The CDFA’s Healthy Soils Initiative
promotes the development of innovative farm and land management
practices that increase water retention and infiltration …
Conservation groups are pushing for passage of a bill in
Congress that would revive migratory bird protections dropped
during the Trump administration. Last year, Trump’s Fish and
Wildlife Service lifted a rule, which said companies that kill
birds in the course of business, called an incidental take,
would have to change their practices and/or pay for habitat
restoration somewhere else. Jason Rylander, senior endangered
species counsel for Defenders of Wildlife, said the Migratory
Bird Protection Act of 2021 would reinstate those requirements,
and not a moment too soon.
The California Water and Wastewater Arrearage Payment Program
(Program), passed as part of Assembly Bill 148, is being
developed and implemented by the State Water Resources Control
Board (State Board). This Program will provide funding for
“community water systems” that have experienced revenue
shortfalls and arrearages on water and wastewater bills during
the COVID-19 pandemic. The Program will prioritize issuing
funding to community water systems first, and will extend
funding to wastewater providers if the Program still has
funding available after providing relief to community water
systems.
Included in the sweeping $1 trillion infrastructure bill
approved by the Senate is funding for Western water projects
that farmers, water providers and environmentalists say are
badly needed across the parched region. … The plan would
provide $1.15 billion for improving water storage and transport
infrastructure such as dams and canals. Groundwater storage
projects, which replenish underground aquifers that aren’t
vulnerable to evaporation, would also get funding.
California Senators Alex Padilla and Dianne Feinstein
introduced a bill on Friday to expand federal authority over
the ecologically threatened Salton Sea east of San Diego
County. The Salton Sea Projects Improvements Act would
significantly expand the ability of the Bureau of Reclamation
to partner with state, local, and tribal governments to address
the public health and environmental crisis at the Salton Sea.
The bill also increases the amount the Bureau of Reclamation is
authorized to spend towards these efforts from $10 million to
$250 million.
In a strong bipartisan vote Tuesday of 69-30, the Senate
advanced the bipartisan infrastructure bill and sent it back to
the House. The INVEST in America Act spends roughly $1 trillion
including $110 billion for roads and bridges, $65 billion to
expand broadband access, and $17 billion for ports and inland
waterways. In the days leading up to the vote the American Farm
Bureau Federation as well as members of the Agricultural
Transportation Working Group urged lawmakers to support the
bipartisan infrastructure bill, which would increase
infrastructure spending by $550 billion over five years.
Whenever politicians are asked about the California water wars
that threaten our well-being in Modesto and Stanislaus County,
eventually the talk gets around to something like, “Well, you
know what we really need is more water storage.” As in dams,
mostly, and also off-stream reservoirs holding water captured
in wet years for use in dry ones. They say something
similar when reporters ask about drought, and sometimes about
wildfires and climate change. -Written by Garth Stapley, Modesto Bee columnist.
What seemed a victory for water users and power customers in
California has been overturned. President Joe Biden rescinded
an environmental opinion issued in the last days of the Trump
Administration — an action that could have a slew of negative
consequences for environmental groups and ag companies as a
three-decade-old law threatens the financial viability of
public utilities in Northern California.
Moving to provide immediate support to communities facing water
supply challenges, the Department of Water Resources (DWR)
Wednesday announced the first round of funding commitments
for $200 million available through the Small Community Drought
Relief Program. DWR, in coordination with the State Water
Resources Control Board, is directing $25 million to 10 small
water systems in Tulare, Siskiyou, Shasta, Lake and Kern
Counties.
The Senate on Tuesday approved an expansive bill to rebuild the
nation’s aging roads and bridges, with $8.3 billion
specifically targeted to water infrastructure projects in the
West and billions more to fund national projects to mitigate
the impact of wildfires. … That includes $1 billion for
water recycling systems and more than $1 billion for water
storage and groundwater storage projects to take advantage of
wet years.
Senators were laboring Sunday toward eventual passage of
a $1 trillion bipartisan infrastructure package, resigned
to stay as long as it takes to overcome Republican holdouts who
want to drag out final votes on one of President Joe Biden’s
top priorities. The bill has won widespread support from
senators across the aisle and promises to unleash billions of
dollars to upgrade roads, bridges, broadband internet, water
pipes and other public works systems undergirding the
nation.
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and U.S. Army
Corps of Engineers (Corps) announced on Aug. 4, 2021, the start
of a long anticipated rulemaking process to revise the
regulatory definition of “waters of the U.S.” (WOTUS) under the
federal Clean Water Act (CWA).1 The WOTUS Rule sets forth the
geographic reach of the agencies’ authority to regulate
streams, wetlands and other water bodies pursuant to the CWA.
Today, U.S. Senator Alex Padilla (D-Calif.) announced that he
secured over $71 million in federal funding for 20 projects
across California in the Senate’s Agriculture, Energy and
Water, and Military Construction Appropriations Subcommittee
bills. The bills were approved by the Senate Appropriations
Committee this week and now await passage by the full
Senate.
Another hurdle has been cleared in the pending and much needed
repairs of a 33-mile stretch of the Friant-Kern Canal. Known as
the Friant-Kern Canal Middle Reach Capacity Project, repairs
will be done on the 33-mile stretch of the canal form between
Lindsay and Strathmore to North Kern County. When the federal
government provided $206 million in funding for the project
last year that meant the project would finally become a
reality.
Senator Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), chairman of the Senate
Appropriations Subcommittee on Energy and Water Development,
applauded the inclusion of California water priorities in the
Energy and Water funding bill for fiscal year 2022, which was
advanced out of committee today.
The bipartisan infrastructure deal struck this week provides
new money for climate resilience unmatched in United States
history: Tens of billions of dollars to protect against floods,
reduce damage from wildfires, develop new sources of drinking
water in areas plagued by drought, and even relocate entire
communities away from vulnerable places. But the bill is
remarkable for another reason. For the first time, both parties
have acknowledged — by their actions, if not their words — that
the United States is unprepared for the worsening effects of
climate change and requires an enormous and urgent infusion of
money and effort to get ready.
Flanked by a hazy backdrop of Lake Oroville with the nearby
Dixie Fire creating a smoke-filled sky, federal and state
politicians representing the north state gathered above the
Hyatt Power Plant at Oroville Dam for a press conference
Tuesday to criticize, in their words, the state’s “gross
mismanagement” of water, wildlands and power.
California Gov. Gavin Newsom has declared a drought
emergency in most counties across the state while experts
predict the current drought will end up being worse than the
one we experienced between 2011-2017. That historic event
was caused by nonstop hot and dry weather aggravated by climate
change. Increasing temperatures and fluctuating
atmospheric patterns reduce rainfall and devastate
farms across the Golden State especially because most farmers
can’t rely on state or federal water projects to help
supplement the lack of rainfall.
But come back in 40 or 50 years, and most California cities
would look very different if [new housing] bills passed. Cities
would be bigger, housing would be cheaper (after inflation is
factored in), and living conditions would be more crowded than
ever before. Neighborhoods filled with single-family homes on
distinct lots would be far rarer than today. That is, if enough
water and energy can be found to make these changes possible,
two problems that grow larger and less predictable the longer
the current drought continues and the more often dry spells
recur in an era of expanded climate change. Written by Thomas Elias, a syndicated columnist.
Confronting the rise of attacks on major American
infrastructure and industry, the White House released an
executive order Wednesday in which President Joe Biden will ask
companies to layer on more cybersecurity protections. The order
follows up on a series of cybersecurity directives prompted
this year when the nation suffered a series of fuel shortages
after Russian-tied cybercriminals launched a ransomware attack
on Colonial Pipeline.
Not a drop of new “moon shoot” water storage has been created
in California for more than 40 years. It’s a point that isn’t
lost on Congressman Josh Harder. Nor is the fact water issues
facing the heart of the Northern San Joaquin Valley are
interconnected with communities often hundreds of miles away
from the 10th District that he represents in Congress. It
is why the Turlock Democrat has pursued do-able water projects
— including those outside of his district that would reduce
efforts to try and commandeer water from the Stanislaus and
Tuolumne watersheds to address fish flow, urban, and irrigation
needs elsewhere — since taking office in 2019.
President Joe Biden’s latest leap into the Senate’s up-and-down
efforts to clinch a bipartisan $1 trillion infrastructure deal
comes with even more at stake than his coveted plans for
boosting road, rail and other public works projects. The
outcome of the infrastructure deal, which for weeks has
encountered one snag after another, will affect what could be
the crown jewel of his legacy. That would be his hopes for a
subsequent $3.5 trillion federal infusion for families’
education and health care costs, a Medicare expansion and
efforts to curb climate change.
A bill recently introduced in the U.S. Senate aims to provide
billions of dollars to improve access to clean water in tribal
lands. One of the senators who introduced the bill, Sen.
Michael Bennet, D-Colo., wrote in the foreword of a report
about tribal water access within the Colorado River Basin that
one estimate states 48% of households within tribal lands lack
clean water or sufficient sanitation.
Senators ran into new problems Monday as they raced to seal a
bipartisan infrastructure deal, with pressure mounting on all
sides to show progress on President Joe Biden’s top priority.
Heading into a make-or-break week, serious roadblocks remain.
Disputes have surfaced over how much money should go to public
transit and water projects.
Last week, the House of Representatives approved legislation
that would require the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency
(EPA) to establish national drinking water standards for
regulating harmful forever chemicals, known as per- and
polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS), that are linked to kidney,
liver and other health problems. … The bill now awaits
consideration in the U.S. Senate. There’s just one problem,
however, as the collective water sector opposes the bill.
The House of Representatives approved a $715 billion
infrastructure plan, and if the Senate passes it, it will mean
$20 million for the Valley Link project to connect Bay Area
Rapid Transit to the Altamont Corridor Express commuter train.
… California would be a big winner under the proposed
law. The bill includes more than $900 million for projects
throughout the Golden State. They include bridges, bike lanes
and express lanes … wastewater and drinking water
projects and other infrastructure to prepare for rising sea
levels.
With rural wells running dry and reservoir levels dwindling
amid the Western drought, California senators are pressing
Congress for an infusion of cash to renovate the state’s
collapsing drinking water system. But instead of new dams or
desalination plants, Senators Dianne Feinstein and Alex Padilla
want … to boost stormwater capture, groundwater recharge
and water recycling efforts in the Golden State and throughout
the U.S.
In a draft report, California says only extremely low levels of
two toxic “forever chemicals” are safe for humans to drink in
water. A July 22 draft report from the California Environmental
Protection Agency would set a science-based safe level—called
a public health goal—of 0.007 part per trillion for
perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA) and 1 ppt for
perfluorooctanesulfonic acid (PFOS) in drinking water. The two
compounds are the two most common per- and polyfluoroalkyl
substances (PFAS)—a group of environmentally persistent
synthetic molecules—found as contaminants in drinking water.
U.S. Rep. David Valadao (R-CA) last week introduced three
amendments to the Energy and Water Development Appropriations
fiscal year 2022 bill that aimed to alleviate California’s
ongoing drought, but House Appropriations Committee Democrats
voted down all three of them during a July 16 markup. The
congressman’s first amendment would have extended California
water storage provisions of the Water Infrastructure
Improvements for the Nation (WIIN) Act for one year …
California took a major step towards regulating dangerous
“forever chemicals” in drinking water by proposing new health
limits for two of the most pervasive contaminants. State
environmental health officials recommended goals of
one part per trillion and less — a minuscule amount 70 times
smaller than the federal government’s non-binding guideline for
drinking water nationwide.
The House on Wednesday approved a bill setting deadlines for
the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to implement drinking
water regulations for so-called forever chemicals.
Perfluoroalkyl and polyfluoroalkyl substances, commonly called
PFAS, are widely used, man-made compounds that are found in
manufacturing and consumer products like Scotchguard,
flame-resistant materials, nonstick cooking surfaces and
firefighting foam used on military bases since the 1940s.
California Farm Bureau, as part of a national coalition
representing thousands of western farmers, ranchers, water
providers, businesses and communities, urged leaders of the
U.S. Senate to take action to address the shortcomings of aging
water infrastructure. Citing an “acute and critical need”
magnified by another all-too-familiar drought, the coalition
sent a letter last week to Chairman Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., and
Ranking Member John Barrasso, R-Wyo., of the U.S. Senate
Committee on Energy and Natural Resources. It called for
increased federal investment in water infrastructure.
Senate Bill 821, Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta: Delta
Independent Science Board, was introduced by the Senate Natural
Resources and Water Committee in March to restore compensation
for the Delta Independent Science Board members. The bill
has been winding its way through the legislature. SB 821 was
passed out of the Assembly on Thursday, July 15 with 70 ayes, 0
noes, and 9 not voting.
Lawmakers and regulators are increasingly mobilizing behind
efforts to crack down on so-called forever chemicals as
pressure to find a solution swells to a fever pitch. At an
inaugural conference pegged to issues around per- and
polyfluoroalkyl substances, EPA Administrator Michael Regan
vowed to “follow the science” on the chemicals and offer a
strong federal partner to local governments.
Alex Padilla made his first official visit to the Central
Valley as U.S. Senator, holding several discussions about
water. Padilla, along with other elected officials, held a
media availability at his only public event of the day — a tour
of the Dos Palos water treatment plant. There, he spoke about
the need to upgrade infrastructure for drinking water, as well
as water for farmers. Padilla says the infrastructure bill
being debated in the Senate will help with water, especially in
underserved areas.
Phoenix Mayor Kate Gallego said water infrastructure and
transit investments in Arizona were two key items discussed
during a meeting with President Joe Biden on
Wednesday. Gallego was part of a bipartisan group of three
governors and four other mayors who met with Biden at the White
House to build support for a proposed $1.2 trillion
infrastructure package under consideration in the U.S.
Senate…. The group also talked about… the state’s long-term
drought and its effects on the Colorado River…
A prominent oil and gas lobbying group seeks to strip
environmental protections from groundwater sources designated
by the state for agricultural use and which may grow
increasingly important to California’s water-scarce future,
according to a memo obtained through a records request. The
proposal, which hasn’t been publicly announced, suggests
removing protections for groundwater reserves underneath 1,500
square surface miles in western Kern County, where the
upper groundwater zone alone can extend down thousands of feet.
Lawmakers in Congress on Friday introduced a bill that would
pump tens of billions of dollars into fixing and upgrading the
country’s dams. The Twenty-First Century Dams Act, introduced
by Democratic U.S. Rep. Annie Kuster of New Hampshire, proposes
to spend nearly $26 billion to make the repairs that would
enhance safety and increase the power generation capacity of
the country’s 90,000 dams. It also calls for removing any dams
that have outlived their usefulness.
California’s fiscal year started more than a week ago, but
lawmakers and Gov. Gavin Newsom still don’t have a budget deal.
They’ve enacted placeholder legislation to keep the government
running while they hash out the final details, but the delay
leaves Californians waiting for details on how money for
critical areas including wildfires and infrastructure will be
spent. It’s a different situation than the budget stalemates of
past decades, when state government had to cut deals with banks
to ensure state workers were paid even as budget negotiations
dragged into the fall.
The Salton Sea has been a health problem for decades with
longtime inaction from agencies charged with actually doing
something about it. But there is recent movement on a couple
wetland projects around the lake.
California has a long history of treating public water as a
commodity instead of a human right and entrusting it to
industries that fail to manage it responsibly. Water is a
public trust resource that needs protection. The federal Water
Affordability, Transparency, Equity and Reliability Act would
put water systems back in the hands of the people who depend on
it for life and livelihood. This bill [S. 11] would set aside
$35 billion annually to shore up drinking and wastewater
systems. It would ensure no one lacks access to water because
they can’t afford it. -Written by Alexandra Nagy, California director
for Food & Water Watch.
Lake Mead, which provides water for 25 million people in
the American West, has shrunk to 36 percent of its capacity.
One rural California community has run out of water entirely
after its well broke in early June. Fields are sitting fallow,
as farmers sell their water allotments instead of growing
crops, putting the nation’s food supply in peril. As the West
withers under extreme drought, legislators in the US House of
Representatives have introduced HR 4099, a bill that would
direct the Secretary of the Interior to create a program to
fund $750 million worth of water recycling projects in the 17
western states through the year 2027.
Except for a brief stint in the military, Paul Crawford has
spent his entire life farming in southern Oregon. First,
as a boy, chasing his dad through hayfields and now, growing
alfalfa on his own farm with his wife and two kids, who want to
grow up to be farmers. … The American west is drying out
as the region faces an unprecedented drought. Few places
are as devastated as the Klamath Basin, where Crawford’s farm
sits. Straddling the border between California and Oregon, the
watershed spans 12,000sq miles – from agricultural lands fed by
Upper Klamath Lake to tribal communities surrounding the
Klamath River.
The powerful interests who vie for shares of the state’s
ever-changing water supply — dubbed “water buffaloes” — are
adept at fending off political and legal assaults by their
rivals and the outcomes of their clashes are often stalemates.
That’s why it was surprising in June to see two game-changing
decrees out of Washington, one from the new Biden
administration and another from the Supreme Court, affecting
two of the state’s most prominent water interests, Southern
California’s Imperial Irrigation District and the San Joaquin
Valley’s Westlands Water District. -Written by CalMatters columnist Dan Walters.
California is answering the call to keep the tap open to
millions of people who have fallen behind on their water bill
payments through a recent $1 billion investment from Gov. Gavin
Newsom. The timely assistance comes amid serious economic
fallout from the pandemic that caused record unemployment and
left 1.6 million households drowning in water debt. At the same
time, some small water systems are struggling to keep the water
flowing due to lost income from unpaid bills. The governor’s
plan addresses both problems, for now. But what happens next
year? -Written by Sen. Bill Dodd (Napa) and Sen. Lena
Gonzalez (Long Beach).
With a record-shattering heat wave suffocating much of the
Pacific Northwest and a drought-fueled wildfire season already
well underway in New Mexico, Arizona and California, President
Biden will attend a virtual meeting with leaders of Western
states on Wednesday to discuss strategies to minimize
weather-related disasters this summer. Jen Psaki, the White
House press secretary, told reporters that the president
planned to bring together members of his cabinet and the
Western governors to assess “the devastating intersection of
drought, heat, and wildfires,” as well as “prevention,
preparedness, and response efforts for this wildfire season.”
As California and the West suffer through an epic drought,
President Joe Biden and Senate Republicans and Democrats have
included $5 billion for Western water projects in their
infrastructure deal. The prospect of federal money comes as
several big-ticket water projects are on the drawing boards in
California — although many are still years from completion and
probably wouldn’t get finished in time to help California with
the current drought. But the federal dollars, which are
probably months and several more negotiations away from
possible approval, could enable California to jump-start
projects that have been in the works for years.
Communities may face a range of issues associated with aging
water infrastructure, including elevated lead levels in tap
water. Because of lead’s toxicity, even at low levels, reducing
lead exposures from drinking water and other sources remains a
public health priority. Other sources of lead exposure include
lead-based paint and contaminated soil and dust from
deteriorated lead-based paint. Nationally, the phaseouts of
leaded gasoline and lead-based paint, along with regulatory
controls and technical changes, have reduced lead
exposures.
U.S. Reps. Peter DeFazio (D-OR), chair of the House Committee
on Transportation and Infrastructure, and Frank Pallone, Jr.
(D-NJ) announced Thursday new details of the $715 billion
INVEST in America Act, which is scheduled to be sent to the
House floor this week. The bill, the congressmen said, will
create jobs, rebuild and reimagine the country’s roads,
bridges, transit, rail, and wastewater infrastructure, as well
as the drinking water infrastructure.
California lawmakers voted [Monday night] to approve a
record-busting state budget that reflects new agreements with
Gov. Gavin Newsom to expand health care for undocumented
immigrants, spend billions to alleviate homelessness and help
Californians still struggling through the pandemic… The
budget includes $1 billion over several years for wildfire
prevention, $3 billion to alleviate drought and $3.7 billion
over three years to mitigate dangers posed by climate change —
but Newsom and legislative leaders are still figuring out how
to spend the funds.
There is no drought – the Los Angeles Times wrote in a recent
editorial. The Times argued “if ‘drought’ means a period of dry
years followed by a return to the norm, California is not in
drought. The current climate is the norm.” That analysis has
important implications for Stockton and other communities along
the San Joaquin River and in the Delta. As our precipitation
increasingly swings between drought and flood, each extreme
challenges our communities. -Written by Douglass Wilhoit, CEO of the Greater
Stockton Chamber of Commerce and a former San Joaquin County
supervisor; and Barbara Barrigan-Parilla, executive
director and co-founder of Restore the Delta.
President Biden and a bipartisan group of senators agreed on a
nearly $1-trillion infrastructure plan Thursday, the
culmination of months of negotiation over a proposal to fortify
the nation’s roads, bridges and broadband internet
access….The plan calls for $109 billion for road and bridge
projects, $7.5 billion to build a new network of electric
vehicle-charging stations, $55 billion to replace all lead
pipes and upgrade water infrastructure….
The drought is intensifying efforts to conserve all of Sonoma
County’s water resources, including a supply that has eluded
oversight until recently: groundwater. But even as plans for
groundwater monitoring and sustainable use proceed, tensions
are building over its management. The authority to evaluate and
regulate groundwater comes from a 2014 law crafted in the
middle of the state’s last drought.
ACWA-sponsored SB 323 passed out of the Assembly Judiciary
Committee on Tuesday and is headed to the Assembly floor. SB
323, authored by Senator Anna Caballero (D–Salinas), would
provide financial stability for public agencies by creating a
120-day statute of limitations for challenges to new water and
sewer rates. This would provide public agency water and sewer
service rates the same protections already afforded to fees and
charges that fund other essential government services.
Growers are dealing with severe cutbacks in the surface water
deliveries they normally receive from reservoirs. The lack of
steady irrigation has already impacted spring cropping
decisions made by farmers. … A bill introduced by
Republican Congressman David Valadao would allow more water to
be moved south from the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta while
keeping protections in place for fish such as the delta smelt
and salmon.
The California Department of Fish and Wildlife (CDFW) today
announced the selection of 28 projects to receive funding for
projects to restore and protect multi-benefit ecosystem
restoration and protection projects under its Proposition 1
grant programs. The awards, totaling $39 million, were made
under CDFW’s 2021 Proposition 1 Watershed Restoration Grant &
Delta Water Quality and Ecosystem Restoration Grant Program
Proposal Solicitation Notice.
Legislation from Sen. Bill Dodd, D-Napa, that would help
hundreds of thousands of Californians who have fallen behind on
their water bills and are at risk of being disconnected from
water service cleared a key committee on Wednesday.
… Sen. Dodd’s legislation comes as the State Water
Resources Control Board heard results of a survey that found
water debt in California climbed to about $1 billion. The
survey estimated 12% of California households are behind on
their water bills with an average debt of $500 per
household.
President Biden’s “Build Back Better” initiative proposes to
invest $111 billion in rebuilding and modernizing drinking
water and wastewater infrastructure, as well as funding other
water quality-related priorities, including addressing per- and
polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) in drinking water
supplies. Legislation proposed in both the Senate and
House of Representatives in the 117th Congress (2021-2022)
reflects a bipartisan effort to translate the President’s goals
into national policy.
Today, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced
selections under two Clean Water Act (CWA) grant programs to
support leadership of Tribes in protecting and restoring water
resources. The agency anticipates awarding approximately $3
million to 18 Tribal nations and one Intertribal organization
under the Tribal Wetland Program Development Grant competition
and an additional $3 million in CWA Section 319 Tribal
Competitive Grants to 32 Tribal nations to support projects to
manage nonpoint source pollution.
Toxic manmade chemicals, like per- and poly-fluoroalkyl
substances (PFAS) and 1,2,3-Tricholoropropane (TCP), are
showing up in water systems across the US. It’s not new, but it
has become more common, as municipalities are now increasing
mandatory testing due to new state and federal
regulations. … TCP was tagged as a carcinogen in
1999 by the state of California which lead to the strictest
state MCL level in the country at 5 ppt. One ppt is the
equivalent of one drop of impurity in 21 million gallons of
water – in other words, TCP is very toxic.
The U.S. House of Representatives’ Transportation and
Infrastructure Committee last week marked up and advanced H.R.
1915, the Water Quality Protection and Job Creation Act of
2021. … By 2035, the City of Los Angeles expects to
recycle 100 percent of its water supplies and reduce its
reliance on costly imported water from the Colorado
River. Truckee Meadows Water Authority in Reno is planning
13-mile pipeline to provide 1.3 billion gallons of recycled
water annually to the Tahoe-Reno Industrial Center, home to
Tesla, Switch and Google, and ensure 20,000 jobs remain in
Nevada.
Excessive groundwater pumping has collapsed the land beneath
several key canals, crimping their ability to move water.
Fixing them will be expensive. There are two bills moving
through the state Legislature and Congress that could provide
some funding. This is the second try for the state bill, Senate
Bill 559 by Senator Melissa Hurtado (D-Sanger). …
Representative Jim Costa (D-Hanford) and Senator Diane
Feinstein (D-Ca.) introduced S. 1179, the Canal Conveyance
Capacity Restoration Act, on April 15.
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and Army Corps of
Engineers announced their intent to revise the reach of the
federal Clean Water Act by changing the definition of “waters
of the United States.” This move, announced yesterday, would
reverse the Navigable Waters Protection Rule adopted during the
Trump administration, which itself replaced a 2015 revision by
the Obama administration.
The Biden administration began legal action Wednesday to repeal
a Trump-era rule that ended federal protections for hundreds of
thousands of small streams, wetlands and other waterways,
leaving them more vulnerable to pollution from development,
industry and farms. The rule — sometimes referred to as “waters
of the United States” or WOTUS — narrowed the types of
waterways that qualify for federal protection under the Clean
Water Act. It was one of hundreds of rollbacks of environmental
and public health regulations under President Donald Trump, who
said the rules imposed unnecessary burdens on business.
Even as a federal infrastructure bill teeters on the brink of
failure, more than 200 Western farm and water organizations
pushing for canal and reservoir repairs are proposing nearly
$49 billion for projects improving water conveyance, dam
safety and forest health. In a letter June 9 to Chairman
Joe Manchin and Ranking Member John Barrasso of the U.S. Senate
Committee on Energy and Natural Resources, organizations
ranging from Western Growers to the Idaho Potato Commission
cited an “acute and critical need” magnified by another
all-too-familiar drought.
With Lake Mead approaching critically-low levels, the Southern
Nevada Water Authority recently turned to the Legislature to
double-down on its existing strategy for using less water: turf
removal. … [Southern Nevada Water Authority general manager
John] Entsminger, in a recent interview, said the prohibition
would result in significant water savings. The removal of an
estimated 3,900 acres of decorative turf could save roughly 9.3
billion gallons of water annually — about 10 percent of the
state’s entire Colorado River allotment.
San Rafael Creek could be dredged — at least in part — next
summer. The Biden administration’s proposed budget sets aside
$6.75 million for the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to begin
working on the $13 million project. The budget must be approved
by congressional committees and is expected to be finalized in
October, according to the city. Due to years of neglect and
minimal funding, the creek has not been fully dredged since
about 2003. It was partially dredged in 2011, but storms have
carried sediment into the channel and shoaled it to depths as
shallow as 2 feet in some parts…
As California responds to yet another drought and prepares for
a future of greater climate extremes, securing funding to boost
the water system’s resilience is a top priority. One go-to
funding source over the last two decades has been state general
obligation bonds. In dollar terms, GO bonds play a relatively
small role in water system spending, yet they punch above their
weight when it comes to filling critical gaps.
In Sin City, one thing that will soon become unforgivable is
useless grass. A new Nevada law will outlaw about 40% of the
grass in the Las Vegas area in an effort to conserve water amid
a drought that is drying up the region’s primary water source:
the Colorado River. Other cities and states around the US have
enacted temporary bans on lawns that must be watered, but
legislation signed Friday by the state’s governor, Steve
Sisolak, makes Nevada the first in the nation to enact a
permanent ban on certain categories of grass.
According to U.S. Congressman Jay Obernolte’s (R-Hesperia)
office, last Tuesday, June 1, he introduced a bill, HR 3649,
titled the Mono Lake Kutadika’a Paiute Tribal Recognition Act
that would grant federal recognition to the Mono Lake
Kutzadika’a tribe as a distinct Native American Tribe. The
legislation was originally introduced by former Rep. Paul Cook.
The bill would address the tribe’s decades-long struggle for
indigenous sovereignty and would afford them the services,
benefits, and rights provided to federally recognized tribes,
says the communique.
They were expert hunters, gatherers and basket weavers who
lived for thousands of years on a trade route over the Sierra
Nevada connecting them with the rest of California. The modern
history of the Mono Lake Kutzadika Paiute people is told mostly
through economic hardship, displacement and a 150-year fight
for federal recognition as a distinct Native American tribe — a
step needed to establish a sovereign land base to call home.
The Biden administration is taking aim at Trump-era rollbacks
to endangered species protections, though environmental
advocates have raised concerns about how long their actions
could take. In a statement on Friday, federal agencies said
they would “initiate rulemaking in the coming months” to either
rescind or revise Trump-era rules that lessened protections for
these species, or reinstate pre-Trump language that provided
additional protections for endangered animals and plants.
Citing numerous “concerns” with the Clean Water Act (CWA)
section 401 water quality certification rule enacted by the
Trump Administration in 2020, the Environmental Protection
Agency (EPA) has issued a Notice of Intention to
reconsider and revise the rule. EPA’s notice states that
the new rule will be “better aligned with the cooperative
federalism principles that have been central to the effective
implementation of the Clean Water Act” and is “responsive to
the national objectives outlined in President Biden’s Executive
Order 13990.”
The Biden Administration last week released its FY 2022 budget
proposal. The $6 trillion dollar budget includes funding for
several water resources priorities, including PFAS research and
remediation, drought resilience, watershed protection, and
infrastructure improvements. The Biden budget proposes an
increase of 16.5% for discretionary, non-defense spending.
Notably, the budget includes $27.9 billion for the Department
of Agriculture (USDA), $17.4 billion for the Department of
Interior (DOI), $6.8 billion for the Army Corps of Engineers
(Corps), and $11.2 billion for the Environmental Protection
Agency (EPA).
Facing a statewide drought that is rapidly draining reservoirs
and agricultural supplies, the bipartisan California Senate
overwhelmingly approved legislation from Sen. Bill Dodd,
D-Napa, to streamline improvements to the state’s outdated
central water delivery system. … California’s 60-year-old
water delivery system, known as the State Water Project, serves
more than 27 million people and 750,000 acres of farmland
through its 700 miles of aqueducts, canals and pipelines. It is
the largest state-owned and operated water system in the
world.
The California Department of Water Resources (DWR) released its
first assessments of groundwater sustainability plans developed
by local agencies to meet the requirements of the Sustainable
Groundwater Management Act (SGMA). DWR has completed its
assessment and approved plans for the Santa Cruz Mid-County
Basin in Santa Cruz County and 180/400 Foot Aquifer Subbasin in
Monterey County.
On Thursday, Senator Melissa Hurtado (D-Sanger) issued the
following statement regarding a
bi-partisan letter she sent that urges the California
Water Commission to prioritize water storage projects in the
Central Valley when assessing how to reallocate funds from
Proposition 1: … California is currently in a state of
emergency due to drought. As a result, the amount of water
allocated to Central Valley farmers has been greatly
reduced.
On Tuesday, the Imperial Irrigation District Board of Directors
will consider the future of IID in the Coachella Valley with a
direct question — should IID stay or should IID go? In my short
tenure on the IID Board, I personally have enjoyed working to
improve our service, responsiveness and outreach to our
Coachella Valley communities and customers. But Assembly Bill
1021 by Assemblyman Chad Mayes, I-La Quinta, threatens the
continued presence of IID in the Coachella Valley … -Written by JB Hamby, vice president of the
Imperial Irrigation District Board of Directors.
A bill aimed at improving the Valley’s two largest canal
systems from continued subsidence-driven damage advanced
through one house of the California State Legislature on
Friday. Senate Bill 559, a top priority for legislators on both
side of the aisle in the San Joaquin Valley and led by Sen.
Melissa Hurtado (D–Sanger), seeks to dedicate $785 million in
spending for improvements to four sets of waterways,
spearheaded by two canals servicing the Central Valley Project:
the Delta-Mendota Canal and the Friant-Kern Canal.
Senator Melissa Hurtado (D-Sanger) released the following
statement after her bill, Senate Bill 559—The State Water
Resiliency Act – passed the Senate 34-1 … The State
Water Resiliency Act of 2021 will allocate $785 million to
repairing vital water delivery systems that provide drinking
water to communities throughout California and water to sustain
the state’s leading agricultural economy. The funds would go to
fixing the Friant-Kern Canal, the Delta-Mendota Canal and major
portions of the California Aqueduct…
The EPA envisions making good on Biden’s pledge to help
communities replace lead drinking water pipes, in part by
bolstering Water Infrastructure and Innovation Act loans to
local water systems. That includes a proposed increase of more
than two and a half times in the budget for the EPA’s grant
program for helping local and tribal governments replace lead
pipes under the Safe Drinking Water Act. Funds for the grant
program would total $81.5 million in fiscal 2022.
Today a bill to sharply reduce lead leaching from water faucets
and fixtures passed the California Assembly. If it becomes law,
it will create the nation’s most legally stringent lead
leaching limit for faucets. Assembly Bill 100, by
Assemblymember Chris Holden (D-Pasadena), passed the state’s
lower house by a vote of 45 – 0. The bill would limit lead
leaching to no more than 1 microgram, making California the
first state to enact a performance standard to ensure faucets
and fixtures are practically lead-free.
Two large reservoirs in our backyard are capable of holding
40,000 acre feet of water to recharge the underground table.
But federal rules prevent them from reaching capacity and it
will take an act of Congress to change the rules. Big Dry
Creek Reservoir in Clovis and Fancher Creek Reservoir east of
Clovis together can hold 40,000 acre feet of storm water.
That’s water that can eventually stream into the underground
water table.
The delta smelt could be declared endangered if Chris Mathys, a
Republican primary challenger to David Valadao, gets his way.
“Federal and state mandated rules related to the delta smelt in
California are severely restricting the releases of surface
water relied upon by California’s farmers and ranchers.
Agriculture products are vital to California’s economy and
farmers depend on an adequate water supply to grow nuts, fruits
and vegetables that provide food for Americans and the rest of
the world,” Mathys wrote in a statement.
A crippling drought — largely connected to climate change — is
gripping the Western United States, affecting over 70 million
people and around 40% of the U.S. … Farmers,
scientists, tribal officials, foresters and other groups
affected by the worsening drought testified at a House Natural
Resources Subcommittee on Water, Oceans and Wildlife hearing on
Tuesday, asking lawmakers for both short-term relief and
long-term solutions from the worsening conditions.
Infrastructure is rightly enjoying its spot in the national
limelight these days, with the Biden Administration busily
unveiling its plans. However, being well intentioned is as
important as being pragmatic. After all, the warning signs have
been there for all to see when it comes to lack of investment
in infrastructure—impacting communities from Los Gatos to
Washington, D.C. -Written by Andy Gere, president and chief
operating officer of San Jose Water.
The notion of access to water for drinking and sanitation as
being a human right – not a privilege or a commodity to be
bought and sold – is based on the understanding that water is
essential for life itself and should not be subject to the
dictates of the market. This understanding parallels other
treatments of vital resources such as housing and healthcare
and has been codified in multiple United Nations frameworks.
Human rights have been less common as a basis for public policy
in the United States, where the more limited concept of civil
rights has predominated. This has begun to change, most notably
with the passage of California’s 2012 Assembly Bill 685 on the
human right to water…
A hopeful for a Fresno-area seat in Congress has initiated a
petition to have the embattled Delta smelt declared
extinct. Chris Mathys said Monday he took the first
step toward that petition, which is a letter of intent to the
U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the state of California 30
days before filing the formal petition. The petition is
similar to a court document in that it needs to lay out the
argument and back it up with facts and science, Mathys said.
California’s Governor Newsom recently declared a drought
emergency throughout much of California and announced over $5
billion in new water program investments. These twin
emergency and funding announcements are a classic “bad-news
creates good news story” (and potentially vice versa) for
California’s water problems. They are opportunities for
innovation and making long-term improvements for California’s
water problems. They also can reward and entrench less
effective programs and approaches.
[On May 20, 2021] Representative Jared Huffman (D-San Rafael)
reintroduced his FUTURE Western Water Infrastructure and
Drought Resiliency Act (FUTURE Act), an ambitious water
infrastructure proposal that is the culmination of months of
public vetting and legislative development. This bill would
develop more resilient water infrastructure, expand the use of
modern water management tools and technologies, and assist
underserved areas in meeting their drinking water needs.
When Sierra snow seeps into the ground or evaporates before it
can flow downstream into reservoirs, you know California is
facing a severe drought. It’s happening this spring up and down
the mountain range that is a primary water source for the
state. Water from snowmelt that hydrologists had expected only
a few weeks ago to replenish foothill reservoirs is vanishing.
It’s being absorbed by the parched soil or dissipating into the
thin mountain air. -Written by George Skelton, a Los Angeles Times
columnist.
California is becoming ground zero for the climate crisis.
Intensifying drought and wildfire emergencies caused by climate
change are the harbingers of a great gamble that risk the loss
of California as we know it. The drought is not an anomaly but
part of a multi-decadal pattern caused by climate change,
threatening dust bowl-like impacts to California’s agricultural
heartland. It fueled the largest wildfires in state history.
More than 4.2 million acres burned last year, causing a toxic
smoke storm that smothered much of the state. -Written by Nayamin Martinez, the executive
director of the Central California Environmental Justice
Network, and Judith Mitchell, who served for seven years
on the California Air Resources Board, and 10 years on the
board of the South Coast Air Quality Management District.
The Estrella-El Pomar-Creston Water District (EPCWD) has begun
creating a groundwater level monitoring network. Initially, the
district has begun work to add 30 new groundwater level
monitoring sites, using existing wells, throughout the
37,000-acre district. The campaign marks a significant
effort in the basin to move toward groundwater sustainability
in the Paso Robles Subbasin, according to the EPCWD.
As more of California sinks into extreme drought, Gov. Gavin
Newsom has asked the Legislature to appropriate billions of
dollars to address critical water needs. In the “May revise”—an
update to the budget proposal he initially submitted to the
Legislature in January—Newsom proposes to spend nearly $3.5
billion on water supply and resilience projects, with total
investment reaching $5.1 billion over multiple years.
California lawmakers should take prompt action before drought
conditions worsen by sending emergency drinking water to
vulnerable communities in parched regions of the state,
legislative advisers say. The nonpartisan Legislative Analyst’s
Office released a report last week providing recommendations on
how to address increasingly dry conditions throughout the
state. Based on an analysis of the state’s previous efforts for
the last major drought, from 2012 to 2016, analysts said
lawmakers should start sending emergency water supplies to
vulnerable communities in the San Joaquin Valley
region…
Arizona’s drought has lawmakers looking into drawing water from
the Mississippi River to be used here in the desert. “This kind
of project would be looking 20 years down the road,” said
Republican Rep. Tim Dunn from Yuma. Dunn sponsored
House Concurrent Memorial 2004, which got bipartisan support in
the Arizona legislature, and urges Congress to study a plan for
a pipeline that would take water out of the Mississippi River
near Davenport, Iowa.
California Governor Gavin Newsom on May 14 unveiled
his May budget revision that allocates $200
million to plug abandoned and orphaned oil and gas wells, many
located near low-income residential areas where the majority of
residents are Latino and Black. In January
2020, a report by the California Council on
Science & Technology revealed that California taxpayers could
be on the hook for more than $500 million to plug thousands of
“orphan” wells drilled and abandoned by oil and gas companies.
.. Plugging all 107,000 oil and wells in California when
they become idle would cost more than $9 billion, the
report also found.
Gov. Gavin Newsom wants to throw $11.8 billion of California’s
money at climate change and the hazards it poses to the state.
The governor’s gargantuan revised budget proposal, released
Friday, includes expenditures to fight and prevent wildfires,
combat sea-level rise, put more Californians behind the wheel
of an electric vehicle and speed up the transition to a
carbon-free electricity grid. Nearly half of his climate change
package — $5.1 billion — would go toward easing the effects of
California’s newly-declared drought and remedying long-term
water supply problems, such as crumbling canals.
With shrinking reservoir levels and a summer of water shortages
impending, drought-ridden California on Wednesday pressed the
Biden administration for more control over future
infrastructure projects planned in the Golden State. California
and a collection of states urged the federal government to drop
a Trump-era rule that reduced states’ authority to deny
permitting and licensing for things like new water
infrastructure, oil pipelines, wastewater plants or development
projects in wetland areas. The states claim the rule gives them
little say over projects that could ultimately harm water
quality and the environment.
Senators Dianne Feinstein and Alex Padilla (both D-Calif.)
today joined with Senators Catherine Cortez Masto and Jacky
Rosen (both D-Nev.) to introduce bipartisan legislation to
extend authorization of the Lake Tahoe Restoration Act. The
original Lake Tahoe Restoration Act was passed in 2000 and
authorized $300 million for the restoration of the lake and
surrounding basin. The current authorization, which was passed
in 2016, will expire in 2024. Reauthorizing the bill will
prevent an interruption in conservation and restoration
planning.
At a time when California is facing severe drought conditions
that triggered Governor Gavin Newsom’s declaring a state of
emergency and providing more than $5 billion dollars for water
infrastructure and drought response funding, Congressman Jim
Costa (CA-16) introduced bipartisan legislation to address
California water supply and water quality goals…
Reps. Jared Huffman and Mike Thompson, along with prominent
North Coast water managers and politicians gathered at a
virtual summit yesterday morning to discuss the severe drought
facing the North Coast and the entire state. At the summit (a
recording of which is available on YouTube), State Senator Mike
McGuire stated that the state legislature is moving forward on
a several billion dollar drought relief package, which would
include $1 billion in grants to help ratepayers and utilities
pay off back bills and $500 million to help smaller low income
communities develop enhanced drinking water supplies, among
other things (read the full list below).
AB-377, is a proposed state Assembly bill titled Water Quality:
Impaired Waters. The premise of this legislation seems to be
that local authorities are responsible for all the dirty water
in local waterways. While the goal of “cleaning up the water”
is commendable the proposed solution is problematic. The Lompoc
City Council discussed a staff request to oppose this
legislation on May 4; the staff explains that “Assembly Bill
(AB) 377 seeks to ensure California’s waterways are drinkable,
fishable and swimmable by 2050.” -Written by Ron Fink, a Lompoc resident.
Governor Gavin Newsom announced an expansion of the drought
emergency to 41 of the state’s 58 counties, dedicating $5.1
billion to boost water infrastructure and an additional $1
billion to paying off nearly the entirety of Californian
household water debt. Yet, while the governor’s plan includes
$150 million for groundwater cleanup and water recycling
measures, it does nothing to speed up the process to bring
overdrafted water basins into full and sustainable operation.
The deadline is currently 2040 for critically overdrafted
basins and 2042 for remaining high and medium priority basins.
Newly announced state funding for the Salton Sea is expected to
maximize habitat outcomes and provide immediate economic relief
to the community. Gov. Gavin Newsom’s $5.1 billion water
infrastructure, drought response and climate resilience
proposal, which he announced Monday as part of his $100 billion
“California Comeback Plan,” includes $220 million for the
Salton Sea. At Tuesday’s Imperial County Board of Supervisors
meeting on Tuesday, District 1 Supervisor Jesus Eduardo Escobar
wanted to know what is meant by providing immediate economic
relief to the community and how this would occur.
Newly released emails reveal that lawyers and lobbyists for
mining companies, developers and the agriculture industry had a
hand behind the scenes in shaping Arizona’s newly adopted law
on clean-water rules for rivers and streams. The emails
show the involvement of these influential groups went beyond
their public endorsements of the legislation. Their lawyers and
lobbyists were given access to offer input while the final
legislation was being drafted, and the emails show they
suggested specific language, offered “wordsmithing” tweaks and
requested significant changes that state officials incorporated
into the bill.
Gov. Gavin Newsom’s $5.1 billion water infrastructure,
drought response, and climate resilience proposal
includes $220 million for the Salton Sea, and Assembly
member Eduardo Garcia, D-Coachella, applauded the announcement.
Garcia, chair of the Assembly Committee on Water, Parks, and
Wildlife, stated in a press release from his office that the
funding would maximize habitat outcomes and provide immediate
economic relief to the community.
Interior Secretary Deb Haaland said Thursday that her
department is pushing forward with its efforts to conserve 30
percent of U.S. land and waters by 2030, even as the
administration’s own findings highlight the need to define what
it means for an area to be considered conserved. Haaland cited
a recent move by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to expand
hunting and fishing opportunities and previewed an upcoming
announcement of $150 million for a program that builds parks in
underserved communities.
Last week, Senator Alex Padilla (D-Ca) announced the
introduction of a bill that will protect special places in the
Los Padres National Forest and Carrizo Plain National Monument
for their ecological, cultural, and recreational values. The
bill also prohibits future oil drilling in certain places,
improves equitable access to the outdoors, and benefits local
and statewide economies. The bill is a companion to
Representative Salud Carbajal’s Central Coast Heritage
Protection Act, which passed the House of Representatives in
February. It … safeguards about 159 miles of wild and scenic
rivers.
In scale and ambition, California’s Sustainable Groundwater
Management Act (SGMA) has few parallels. And the work becomes
increasingly urgent as the climate crisis makes water shortages
increasingly severe. … This emphasis on local expertise
points to SGMA’s possibilities — and its potential pitfalls —
especially when it comes to deciding what “sustainable” water
management means. Each management body has wide discretion to
define “sustainability” — and the path to
sustainability by 2040 — for its particular basin.
Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey signed a landmark water protection bill
Wednesday to ensure clean water in nearly 800 Arizona streams,
lakes and rivers that are critical for everyday use. The
legislation will preserve water quality, list protected Arizona
waters and develop management practices that will protect the
waterways.
In many American communities, rivers irrigate the farms that
feed families, quench people’s thirst—rivers are the source of
more than two-thirds of the drinking water in the U.S.—sustain
wildlife habitat, and provide an economic boost for
communities. Yet only a very small portion of those waterways
are protected from threats ranging from pollution to damming,
which would wreck the water’s natural flow.
… California’s Regional Water Quality Control Boards
have authority to designate ONRWs but to date have done so for
only two bodies of water: Lake Tahoe and Mono Lake. However,
the state did initiate an analysis of the Smith River as
an ONRW but has not completed the effort. The Smith is a
Pacific salmon stronghold.
When Ramona Hernandez turns on her kitchen faucet in El Adobe,
an unincorporated town just a few miles southeast of
Bakersfield, the water that splashes out looks clean and
inviting. But she doesn’t dare drink it. … Drinking the
tap water in this tiny community of dusty ranches and unpaved
roads could expose Hernandez to arsenic. So, for years, she and
her husband, Gerardo, have shuttled twice a week to the nearby
town of Lamont to load up on bottled water. At a cost of about
$80 a month, it’s enough for drinking and cooking.
One thing that’s been re-emphasized, time and again, during the
pandemic travails of the past 14 months: Farming is essential.
During the coming few months, as California struggles through
another drought, we’ll learn whether our elected and appointed
public officials feel the same way. [A]n overarching, long-term
problem needs to be solved to make sure farm employees can not
just work safely, but can have jobs, period: water supplies.
The Fresno County Board of Supervisors on Tuesday passed a
resolution proclaiming a local drought emergency. The vote on
the resolution during Tuesday’s special meeting was unanimous.
The resolution comes after Fresno leaders joined officials from
three other Central Valley counties on Friday to declare a
regional drought emergency and urge Gov. Gavin Newsom to do the
same statewide. Fresno County Chairman Steve Brandau said the
drought “is a crisis that we are putting upon ourselves.” He
said he’s not a water expert, but it has been “painful” for him
to watch “as water flows out into the ocean unused for human
resources.”
On Thursday the U.S. Senate voted to pass S. 914, the
Drinking Water and Wastewater Infrastructure Act
(DWWIA). It is the first infrastructure bill approved by
the Senate this Congress. The bipartisan, comprehensive clean
water and drinking water infrastructure legislation will
authorize strong annual water infrastructure investment to help
boost total federal investment. In full, the legislation
authorizes more than $35 billion for drinking water and
wastewater resource development projects across the country …
Now that Democrats have full control of Washington for the
first time in a decade, Bay Area lawmakers want to make sure
they don’t walk away empty-handed. For many of them, that means
seeing green. After several years of historically severe
wildfires, heat waves and recurring drought conditions, bills
related to climate change are at the top of the agenda for many
lawmakers with local ties. Some of the legislative proposals
… would address the threats of extreme weather by allocating
more money to reduce wildfire risks, strengthen water
infrastructure and upgrade the electric grid.
California Senators have unveiled a $3.4 billion drought relief
package to address the hardships created by ongoing dry
conditions. The Senate Budget Plan on Drought, Safe Drinking
Water, Water Supply Reliability, and Ratepayer Assistance would
be the single largest investment to address drought challenges
in California. During the Senate Budget & Fiscal Review
Subcommittee 2 on Resources, Environmental Protection and
Energy hearing, the proposal was passed by a 4-0 vote. The
proposal offers a comprehensive approach to drought relief,
with funding designated for water supply projects, research,
and water-use efficiency projects.
California could get 600,000 new acres of federally protected
wilderness under legislation introduced in the U.S. Senate
recently. The designation would ensure the lands remain free of
development, vehicles and commercial activity. … It
would also designate more than 583 miles of river — including
45 miles of San Gabriel River tributaries, as well as Little
Rock Creek — as “wild and scenic rivers,” a protection that
prohibits dams or new mining.
A little more than a week ago, Gov. Gavin Newsom announced that
not only would California effectively ban hydraulic fracturing,
or fracking, by 2024, but the state also would work to phase
out oil extraction entirely by 2045. … It was — like the
governor’s promise last year that the state would ban the sale
of new gas-powered cars by 2035 — a sweeping pronouncement
meant to show urgency in addressing climate change while the
state he leads struggles with many of its most dire effects.
But meeting those goals requires complex regulatory
maneuvering.
As California slowly emerges from the depths of the COVID-19
pandemic, one remnant left behind by the statewide lockdown
offers a sobering reminder of the economic challenges still
ahead for millions of the state’s residents and the water
agencies that serve them – a mountain of water debt. Water
affordability concerns, long an issue in a state where millions
of people struggle to make ends meet, jumped into overdrive
last year as the pandemic wrenched the economy.
On the way out the door, the Trump administration committed
many environmental and financial scandals. One can cost
low-income water users while lining the pockets of one of
California’s largest and most powerful water districts. The
focus of one scandal was the failure of the Trump
administration to collect required fish and wildlife mitigation
costs set out in the Central Valley Project Improvement Act.
Passed by Congress in 1992, it established new financing
rules. -Written by Caty Wagner, the Southern California
Water Organizer for Sierra Club California, and Brandon
Dawson, the acting director of Sierra Club California.
Rarely has a routine water resources bill generated so much
political buzz, but as senators hoisted the measure to passage
Thursday the bipartisan infrastructure legislation served as a
potential template for building consensus around President Joe
Biden’s ambitious American Jobs Plan. The Drinking Water and
Wastewater Infrastructure Act of 2021 authorizes about $35
billion over five years to improve leaky pipes and upgrade
facilities, and is widely supported by lawmakers and their
states back home. This time, though, it could be so much more —
a building block in Biden’s broader $2.3 trillion proposal to
invest in roads, bridges and other infrastructure.
British journalist James Bartholomew is widely credited with
creating the phrase “virtue signaling” to describe positioning
oneself on the popular side of an issue without actually doing
anything about it. Politicians are particularly prone to
uttering words or making token efforts on difficult issues to
stave off criticism about their failure to act meaningfully.
Gov. Gavin Newsom is California’s champion virtue-signaler as
he faces a recall election later this year. … There’s no
better example than Newsom’s ever-shifting attitude toward
hydraulic fracturing to increase petroleum production. -Written by Dan Walters
More than a dozen Central Valley lawmakers and elected
officials met on Friday to declare a regional drought emergency
and urge Gov. Gavin Newsom to do the same statewide. Three
state senators and three Assembly members joined the chairs of
the boards of supervisors from Fresno, Madera, Tulare and Kings
counties in a bipartisan news conference at Harlan Ranch in
Clovis to call for action that the group said is necessary to
divert a crisis.
