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Water conservation figures for April released this week show the state’s urban residents used 21.7 percent less water than in April 2013, the year used as the pre-drought benchmark. Local water agencies did much better, with most reporting savings more than double the state average. The Water Resources Control Board released the information Tuesday. The Paradise Irrigation District led the local group with a 56.8 percent reduction compared to April 2013. Water use was calculated at 69 gallons per person per day.

 

It may not be raining much anymore, but all that water is still doing a number on some growers of California peaches, walnuts and almonds. Exactly how big of a number is still unknown. Janine Hasey, a University of California Cooperative Extension farm advisor in Yuba, Sutter and Colusa counties, said that her area was seeing two separate issues. One involved river bottom orchards inside the levees, which flooded several times this year. “The growers actually know that there’s that risk involved,” Hasey said. “It’s just that this year, the rivers ran high for a long time.”

With the most pressing part of the Oroville spillway emergency over, the state Department of Water Resources now turns its attention to another juggling act. The challenge is keeping the lake low enough so the spillway doesn’t need to be used again until winter, yet high enough so that tourists still come to the lake for recreation — and hopefully spend money in an area that’s already taken a huge hit to its economy and its image. Another challenge is what to do if the tourists do come, because the largest boat ramp on the lake is inaccessible.

In the latest skirmish over transparency at the troubled Oroville Dam, a Northern California activist group has sued state officials alleging they’re illegally withholding information about potentially toxic asbestos. AquAlliance, a Chico-based advocacy group focused on Sacramento Valley water issues, filed a lawsuit in Sacramento Superior Court on Tuesday alleging the Department of Water Resources broke state records laws when it denied the group’s request for emails containing information about the asbestos at the dam. The state did release nine documents, the group said, but not the relevant emails.