States, federal and Mexican officials hailed a binational agreement this fall that they said could lead to a radical shift in how the region prepares for and responds to drought. But three months later, they appear no closer to a drought contingency plan, as negotiations have pitted states and water districts against one another, as the U.S. tries to hammer out details of the plan.
Rep. Jared Huffman (D-San Rafael) has sent a letter to Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke, urging him to recover $84.8 million in taxpayer money that was identified in a recent inspector general report detailing how the funds were misspent, according to information released Friday by Huffman’s office. The funds were to benefit a select few California water districts participating in the “WaterFix” planning process, according to a report titled “The Bureau of Reclamation Was Not Transparent in Its Participation in the [San Francisco] Bay Delta Conservation Plan.”
Both sieges began in darkness with fierce winds that made the flames impossible to stop. Hurricane-force gusts pushed the flames over highways that should have been barriers and into neighborhoods so quickly that officials said they were helpless to protect the homes in their path. The wine country fires that ravaged Northern California in October and the firestorm in Southern California this month have capped the most destructive year for fires in state history.
This is how dry it has been so far this season: California’s chances of having a normal “water year” have fallen to around 33 percent in much of the state, according to a federal scientist. Michael Dettinger, a hydrologist with the U.S. Geological Survey, said those dismal odds are based on the amount of rain and snow that has fallen so far this year – and the history of how much precipitation California traditionally gets in the remaining months of the rainy season.
Friday is the deadline for San Diego residents and business owners to apply for a rebate from the city for removing grass and replacing it with drought tolerant landscaping. The turf rebate program was very popular in the height of the drought. In past years, the money was used up immediately. This year, the city opened applications for rebates for two weeks in October and had 120 takers, said Brian Hojnacki, a management analyst with the city’s Public Utilities Department.
A new $4.7 billion proposal from the Sites Project Authority to build up to 11 new dams and two reservoirs in the Sacramento Valley presents a threat to the salmon on the Trinity and Klamath Rivers, and years of decisions to provide them water. The new proposed Sites and Holthouse Reservoirs in Northern California could store up to 1.8 million acre feet of water, making them almost half the size of Shasta Reservoir and twice the size of Folsom Reservoir.
A U.S. government weather forecaster on Thursday said La Niña conditions are predicted to continue through the Northern Hemisphere winter 2017-18. The Climate Prediction Center (CPC), an agency of the National Weather Service, in a monthly forecast pegged the chance of La Nina developing at about 80 percent, with a transition to ENSO-neutral most likely during the mid-to-late spring.
When I first moved to California from Ohio in the 1990s, I spotted a postcard in a gift shop that noted the state’s four seasons: wildfires, mudslides, earthquakes and riots. The postcard wasn’t entirely wrong. Outside of drought years, the state does suffer through a regular cycle of fires, slides and earthquakes, although the riots aren’t actually a seasonal thing. Californians are accustomed to the state’s weather disasters the same way a Kansan is accustomed to tornado drills.
In a new report on the state’s water priorities, the Public Policy Institute of California (PPIC) offered the nation some guidance on how it might address issues that are burdening regions all over the country. “This past year was a prime example of California’s highly variable climate — and a precursor of the types of extremes that are expected to become more common,” the report reads. “After five years of drought exacerbated by record heat, 2017’s record rain and snow brought more challenges — stressing dams and levees, causing landslides, and adding fuel to fire-prone landscapes.”
WHEN THE DUST RISES IN NORTH SHORE, a small farmworker town at the edge of the Salton Sea, Jacqueline Pozar’s nose often starts to bleed. Then her teacher at Saul Martinez Elementary School in nearby Mecca calls her mom, Maria, and asks her to come pick up her daughter. Jacqueline is seven years old. “I feel really bad because I can’t do anything for her,” Maria Pozar says.
The Water News Network is San Diego County’s source for water news and information.
