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Drought Poll: Most Californians See Serious Water Shortage Despite Rains

Despite the wettest winter in five years, an overwhelming majority of Californians believe that the state faces an extremely serious water shortage and plan to continue conserving water, according to a poll released Thursday.

 The poll, carried out by the Field Research Corporation, sampled 800 registered voters across the state. It’s the fifth such survey that’s been carried out since April 2014, tracking Californians’ changing attitudes as the historic drought dragged on.

OPINION: California’s Water Injustice

El Niño has doused northern California, but farmers in the state’s Central Valley won’t see much benefit. The Obama Administration is again indulging its progressive friends at the expense of low-income communities.

OPINION: GOP Needs to Drop Delta Bill

Once again, House Republicans have proposed to weaken the Endangered Species Act at the expense of the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta, a day after the Metropolitan Water District committed to spending $175 million to buy five Delta islands.

The combination is enough to give some Northern California environmentalists the willies. The seller, a partnership led by Swiss-based Zurich Insurance Group that owned the islands, long sought to make money off the islands, perhaps by turning them into reservoirs. The buyer, MWD, has designs related to its responsibility to supply water to 19 million Southern Californians.

Congressional Challenge to Obama Water Deal in California

California Democrats in Congress launched challenges Thursday to a proposed Obama administration settlement with a powerful California water district, including announcing their own probe of the deal.

The multi-front assault by the deal’s opponents comes as the U.S. Department of Interior and other federal agencies near conclusion on negotiations related to the settlement with Central California’s Westlands Water District, the country’s largest irrigation district.

State Bill Would Bolster Sycuan’s Water Supply — and Possibly a New Hotel

About half the Sycuan Indian tribe relies heavily on a single groundwater well for water. The whole tribe now wants access to the same water most San Diegans enjoy – Colorado River water, Northern California water and desalinated Pacific Ocean water.

Most of San Diego’s state legislative delegation is pushing a bill that could make it happen. The water could secure the tribe’s supply and perhaps fuel future development, including a new 300-room hotel and possible casino expansion.

Before-and-After Photos of California Reservoirs Show Impact of Drought, El Niño

Dramatic photographs showing California’s diminishing, drought-ravaged reservoirs circulated all over news sites and social media last year. Images of exposed lake beds with parched, cracked earth became symbols of the Golden State’s water crisis.

The story changed this winter. After four solid drought years, a series of storms walloped the state and the Sierra Nevada. The El Niño wasn’t the “Godzilla” many experts predicted, but it did bring above-average rain fall to the state overall, building up the snow pack and dumping billions of gallons of water into the state’s network of over 1,300 reservoirs.

Dumping Water in the Middle of a Drought Recovery

One of the state’s driest regions has long been flush with water, a reminder that — even in the current, ridiculous system — it’s possible to have plenty of water if the bureaucrats plan ahead and (repeat slowly) build water-storage facilities.

Furthermore, while desalination is one critical piece of the state’s long-term water puzzle, the environmentalist-friendly California Coastal Commission has delayed permits for a desalination plant in Huntington Beach that’s nearly identical to the one recently opened Carlsbad. The commission’s concern? Its effect on plankton.

Striking Back on Delta Land Buy

Declaring that the Delta “will not be the next Owens Valley,” San Joaquin and Contra Costa counties — along with farmers and environmental groups — sued Thursday to block a Southern California water district from buying more than 20,000 acres of farmland in the heart of the estuary.

The lawsuit, filed in San Joaquin County Superior Court, charges that the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California violated the law when it determined that the $175 million land buy is exempt from environmental study.

San Diego-Los Angeles Water War Boils Over

The San Diego County Water Authority has filed its fourth lawsuit against the Los Angeles based Metropolitan Water District of Southern California, alleging that MWD’s newly adopted rates for 2017 and 2018 violate California law, the state Constitution and common law.

San Diego contends that increases require rates to be set based upon cost of service. MWD adopted the rates at its April 12 meeting

Land Purchase in Northern California Delta Challenged

Officials fighting plans by the state to build two giant tunnels under the Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta to send water south took their case to court Thursday, seeking to block one of the project’s main backers from finalizing a key land deal.

San Joaquin and Contra Costa counties say Metropolitan Water District of Southern California failed to perform environmental reviews before entering into a $175 million deal to buy sprawling delta islands east of San Francisco.