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There are over 500 wells pumping water from the same source — the Eastern San Joaquin Groundwater Sub-Basin. That includes municipal wells in Manteca, Ripon, Lathrop, Stockton, and Lodi as well as agricultural wells and domestic wells serving rural homes. You may consider that irrelevant information given water comes out of your tap when you turn the faucet on. But what local agencies are doing in the next few years to create a framework to manage the water basin to meet a pending state mandate requiring groundwater basin sustainability will impact how freely water flows and determine who gets how much water.

After slowing to a trickle during the past five years of punishing drought, hydroelectric power in California is poised to make a major comeback this spring and summer, thanks to the wet winter. Across Northern California, hydroelectricity producers say their reservoirs are brimming at levels not seen in decades. Together, their dams should produce as much as 21 percent of the state’s total electricity output this year, according to projections from the California Energy Commission. That would be the highest percentage for hydropower since 2011, according to the commission’s Energy Almanac. That was the last wet winter before the drought.

The Santa Fe Irrigation District’s (SFID) board voted unanimously, last week, to lift all restrictions on water use by its customers—essentially declaring that the official drought has ended for the 20,000 residents of Solana Beach, Rancho Santa Fe, and Fairbanks Ranch. Local news source the Del Mar Times noted that the decision came at the tail end of one of the wettest winters in the state’s recent history—during which time five years of drought gave way to concerns over flooding.

David Manahan has a lot of responsibilities as director of the Sierra Expeditionary Learning School here. This year, a major one has been digging out from under the mountains of snow burying sidewalks and classroom entrances of the K-8 charter school.