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Initiative Would Allocated Two Percent of State Budget to Water

/in , , /by /The Porterville Recorderby Charles Whisnand

There have been all kinds of efforts and money allocated to trying to solve California’s water woes. Now an organization states it has the solution — the 2 percent solution.

In what it’s calling the 2 percent solution More Water Now is working to place an initiative on the November 2022 ballot that would require 2 percent of the state budget to be allocated to the state’s water resources. If placed on the ballot and approved the water abundance ballot initiative would set aside 2 percent of the state budget to water.

There has been a great deal of water allocated toward dealing with California’s water issues, which includes a $7.5 billion bond measure that was passed by the state’s voters in 2014. But seven years later that bond has done little to place a dent in dealing with the state’s water woes.

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S.F. to Pay $600 Million to Keep Low-lying Neighborhoods From Flooding. It Will Probably Take Seven Years

/in , , /by /San Francisco Chronicleby Michael Cabanatuan

San Francisco has pledged to invest another $600 million into the city’s sewer system in an effort to prevent chronic flooding in low-lying areas as part of an agreement with state water quality officials.

The San Francisco Bay Regional Water Quality Control Board announced the tentative pact, which was negotiated with city officials but needs final approval from the Board of Supervisors and Mayor London Breed. The city’s Public Utilities Commission has recommended approval.

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Drought-Hit Blue Mesa Reservoir Losing 8 Feet Of Water To Save Lake Powell. A Western Slope Marina Feels The Pain.

/in , /by /CPR Newsby Michael Elizabeth Sakas

People wait in line at Elk Creek Marina to back their trailers into the water to pull their boats out of the lake. Some, like Walter Swetkoff, are frustrated.

Swetkoff and his wife have sailed Blue Mesa Reservoir outside of Gunnison, Colo., for more than 30 years. The National Park Service told everyone who stores their boats at the marina they had 10 days to get out of the water because of the drought.

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Will Salton Sea Efforts Get Promised $220 Million in California Budget or Not?

/in , , /by /Palm Springs Desert Sunby Janet Wilson

Concerned that tens of millions of dollarspromised to help address woes at the Salton Sea could vanish from this year’s state budget, a chorus of Riverside and Imperial County officials this week wrote to Gov. Gavin Newsom and California Natural Resources Secretary Wade Crowfoot politely demanding that the funding stay on track.

“In May, we joined regional leaders in lauding your decision to include $220 million for the Salton Sea as part of a $5.1 billion dollar ‘California Roars Back’ plan,” wrote the president and vice president of the Salton Sea Authority, a joint powers agency comprising area water districts, both counties and the Torres Martinez Desert Cahuilla Indians.

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Wildfires are Putting Water Supplies at Risk, and Corporate America is Scared

/in , , /by /CNBCby Diana Olick

As wildfires tear across America’s West, the immediate risk is to life and property, but they will eventually affect water supplies.

That’s one reason large corporations are beginning to help fund forest restoration in order to mitigate their water risk.

The water supply for many communities, including large cities, starts in mountains and national forests. In California, about 70% of the water either starts or flows through national forests, according to Forest Service estimates.

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California Water Suppliers Cast 1st Challenge to Strict Drought Rules

/in , , /by /Courthouse News Serviceby Nick Cahill

Freshly cut off from their chief water supply, a group of California water agencies in one of the state’s most fertile farming areas sued on Wednesday to freeze the latest round of emergency drought rules.

In a lawsuit filed in Sacramento County Superior Court, the suppliers argue they were denied due process when state regulators ordered thousands of landowners last month to cease diversions from the Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta due to drought conditions. They claim the sweeping water curtailments were based off faulty data and will cause permanent damage to pricey fruit and nut orchards.

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‘Wonderful’: Tooleville Relieved in State’s Force for Water Consolidation

/in , , /by /The Sun Gazetteby Ben Irwin

Last week, the State Water Board finally intervened in the unincorporated area of Tooleville’s 20-year struggle to obtain the basic human right to clean drinking water with a letter to the city of Exeter and the Tooleville Mutual Nonprofit Water Association, giving the two parties six months to hash out terms for a voluntary consolidation of Tooleville to Exeter’s water system or face a mandatory order with much less cooperation.

Repeal of County Law Prohibiting Private Operation of Desal Plants Set for Sept. 21 Discussion

/in , , /by /Monterey County Weeklyby Christopher Neely

Monterey County is the only county is California with a law that prohibits private companies from operating new desalination plants. That law, passed in 1989, will be up for a potential repeal when the county’s supervisors meet on Sept. 21.

The law has been thrust into the spotlight as Algonquin Power and Utilities Corp., a publicly traded, $11 billion Canada-based company, has proposed construction of what could be a massive regional desalination plant in Moss Landing.

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How Biden’s Team Rushed to Dump a Trump-era PFAS Assessment

/in , , /by /E&E Newsby E.A. Crunden

Trump-era EPA appointees engaged in “considerable political level interference” on an assessment for a controversial “forever chemical,” documents obtained by E&E News indicate.

But the Biden administration wasted no time in yanking that document, moving to scrub the assessment of alterations made by political appointees and restore language advocated by EPA career scientists shortly after the president’s inauguration.

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La Niña Responsible for Megadroughts in North and South America, Study Finds

/in , , /by /Courthouse News Serviceby Jon Parton

La Niña, the climate event that causes water to be colder than normal in the eastern Pacific, has now been shown by new research released Monday to be responsible for simultaneous megadroughts in the North and South American Southwest over the past 1,000 years.

Megadroughts are extended periods of drought that last at least 20 years. In a study published in the journal Nature, researchers found that these megadroughts occurred simultaneously in the North American and South American Southwest “regularly” and often during a La Niña event.

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