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State Water Board staff recently released a draft proposal to update minimum flow standards for the Lower San Joaquin River to the Delta. This is only one part of the information needed. To provide a complete picture of the needs in the Delta, I urge the board to move quickly to complete the remainder of their analysis on the Sacramento River basin.Delay may be too costly. The need to improve our aquatic ecosystems is urgent. Many communities are paralyzed and fearful of a lengthy and unpredictable regulatory process.

“The Shasta Dam raise, Sites Reservoir and the Delta Tunnels need to be considered as one project,” emphasized Caleen Sisk, Chief and Spiritual Leader of the Winnemem Wintu Tribe. “Without one, you can’t have the others. If the tunnels are built, there will be no water to put in them. You need Sites Reservoir to provide the water for the tunnels and the Shasta Dam raise to provide water for Sites.” “Although the state and federal governments are saying they are separate projects, they are all really one project,” noted Sisk.

Drive through rural Tulare County and you’ll hear it soon enough, a roar from one of the hundreds of agricultural pumps pulling water from beneath the soil to keep the nut and fruit orchards and vast fields of corn and alfalfa lush and green under the scorching San Joaquin Valley sun. Well water is keeping agriculture alive in Tulare County – and much of the rest of the San Joaquin Valley – through five years of California’s historic drought.