Thanks to a series of recent snow storms, drought conditions in Colorado have shown substantial improvements over the past month, including the past week, with extreme drought nearly disappearing from the state. A remaining sliver of exceptional drought – the worst category – in southwest Archuleta County disappeared in the latest report from the National Drought Mitigation Center.
The top state agencies that manage water and wildlife resources in California submitted a package of voluntary agreements with water districts to the State Water Resources Control Board on Friday, as an alternative to controversial flow requirements approved in December for the Tuolumne, Stanislaus and Merced rivers. The agreements, hammered out in the waning hours of Gov. Jerry Brown’s administration and favored by Gov. Gavin Newsom, combine increased river flows with a larger set of tools for restoring salmon in rivers that feed into the San Joaquin-Sacramento Delta.
The storms hitting California in February have left their mark on California’s largest and most important water reserve. Shasta Lake jumped 39 feet in elevation since February 1 and as of Tuesday it was at 85 percent of capacity and only 25 feet from its crest. Amid a wet winter, dramatic lake level rises have been common this year. Folsom Lake east of Sacramento rose 30 feet in January, while Lake Oroville shot up 75 feet in February.
Oceanside announced it will receive a $2.6 million federal grant to build two more of the wells that the city has used for more than 20 years to supply a portion of its drinking water. The wells pump brackish water from what’s called the Mission Basin, an area near the airport, the old swap meet property and the San Luis Rey River. The city filters the water using the same reverse osmosis process used on a much larger scale in Carlsbad to desalinate seawater.
California’s unusually wet and cold winter has caused epic snow, serious flooding and a renewed interest in umbrellas and portable heaters. But the atmospheric river storms have also put a huge dent in the state’s water woes — at least for now. It’s common in a wet winter, though not a guarantee. Here’s a rundown on how this winter’s storms have affected California, from the pages of The Times.
The Upper San Gabriel Valley Municipal Water District is launching the region’s first ever Residential Plant Voucher Program to incentivize residents to transform their landscapes with drought-tolerant plants and develop water-efficient gardening practices, it was announced Friday. The program will provide up to $250 dollars of water efficient plants from Garden View Nursery to qualifying residents, the water district press release said. The nursery was picked because it’s centrally located within Upper District’s area of service in Irwindale and has a wide selection of native plants and trees, the press release said.
Proposed increases in city water and sewer rates will be the subject of a City Council public hearing on Tuesday night. City staff is recommending the water commodity (use) rate increase by 4.5 percent and the fixed water meter charge be increased by 7.5 percent. The staff report also recommends a 3.35 percent increase in the sewer commodity rate and a 3.25 percent hike in the sewer service charge. However, the temporary Drought Recovery Surcharge, in effect since January 2016, expired Dec. 30, meaning customers began receiving a 75-cent-per-unit break on their bills last month. A unit is 748 gallons. Assuming a single-family household uses 25 units of water the bi-monthly bill has included a $16.50 surcharge.
Powerful rainstorms have battered Northern California this week. The culprit? Atmospheric rivers. The rains were born far away, deep in the tropical Pacific, where water evaporated from the warm ocean surface and fizzed into the atmosphere. The drenched air parcel flow then moved sinuously along, an “atmospheric river” winding its way toward land. When that wet air hit a coast—in this case the West Coast of the U.S.—it dumped that water out as the rain and snow that has overwhelmed Northern California this week.
The Board of Directors of the San Diego County Water Authority announced out of closed session that they had made Deputy General Manager Sandy Kerl the acting general manager of the agency. She begins in that role March 1. Current General Manager Maureen Stapleton announced her retirement recently. But she won’t retire right away. She will use almost a year and a half of accrued vacation to stay on the books until July 2020, when she will officially retire. Stapleton got a round of kudos from her counterparts.
The Water News Network is San Diego County’s source for water news and information.
