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Opinion: Why Are Taxpayers Footing Klamath River Dam Removal Cost?

/in , , /by /CalMattersby Dan Walters

Decades of political conflict over the fate of four obsolete dams on the Klamath River reached a turning point last week with a multi-party, two-state “memorandum of understanding” to remove them in hopes of restoring salmon runs.

California Gov. Gavin Newsom, Oregon Gov. Kate Brown, heads of two Indian tribes that depend on the river for sustenance, and an executive of Warren Buffett’s PacificCorp that owns the dams announced agreement on a $450 million removal project.

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The Future of Madera Groundwater is Being Decided. Do Residents Have a Say?

/in , , /by /The Fresno Beeby Monica Vaughan

If you’re worried about your well going dry and who will pay to drill deeper, or about your community having enough safe and clean water, or about your farm’s ability to irrigate, this information is for you.

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Conservationists Challenge ‘Destructive’ Central California Dam Project

/in , , /by /Courthouse News Serviceby Martin Macias Jr

A proposed dam in California’s Central Valley is billed as a vital agricultural resource. But conservationists say it would also flood important cultural and recreational sites for surrounding communities and destroy wildlife habitat.

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Weary but Determined, California’s Small, Family-Owned Farms Fight Through the Pandemic

/in , , /by /Los Angeles Timesby Lucas Kwan Peterson

Vince Bernard loves his trees. He’ll tell you as much. They are what have sustained him and his family for decades at Bernard Ranches. Bernard grows mostly citrus with his wife, Vicki, in Riverside, where a pair of navel orange trees planted in 1871 marked the beginning of the area’s storied citrus industry.

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Board Approves Next Phase of Regional Water Conveyance System Study

/in , , /by /Water News Network Quoted: San Diego County Water Authority

The San Diego County Water Authority’s Board of Directors authorized staff to launch the next phase of a study assessing options for long-term water deliveries to sustain the region’s economy and quality of life.

The decision follows months of community dialogue about Phase A of the Regional Conveyance System Study, which was released in August. The study demonstrated the technical viability and economic competitiveness of two routes for an aqueduct to transport the Water Authority’s independent, high-priority Colorado River water to San Diego County.

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Rep. Ruiz Introduces Salton Sea Bill in Congress to Provide Funding, Increase Air Quality Requirements

/in , , /by /Palm Springs Desert Sunby Mark Olalde

Southern California Democrats Rep. Raul Ruiz and Rep. Juan Vargas introduced a new bill on Thursday that would force the federal government to take a more active role in funding and managing Salton Sea habitat restoration and dust suppression.

HR 8775, the Salton Sea Public Health and Environmental Protection Act, would create an interagency working group called the Salton Sea Management Council to coordinate projects around the lake’s receding shoreline.

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Colorado River Users Expect Biden to Put Focus on Climate Change

/in , , /by /Bloomberg Lawby Tripp Baltz

The incoming Biden administration will lead efforts to craft a new water-management regime for the seven-state Colorado River Basin, and people involved in the process expect any changes to reflect the impact of climate change in the basin.

The Bureau of Reclamation, under the Interior Department, will lead negotiations to replace 13-year-old interim guidelines used to operate the basin’s two major reservoirs, Lake Powell and Lake Mead. The Interior secretary also manages the lower basin, containing all the water below Hoover Dam.

Revisions should reflect ecological values, water rights of American Indian tribes, and the need for more conservation measures by users in the seven states—Arizona, California and Nevada in the lower basin and Colorado, New Mexico, Utah and Wyoming in the upper basin, those involved in the process said.

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Oceanside Receives $175K Grant to Boost Restoration of Loma Alta Slough

/in , , /by /Times of San Diegoby City News Service

The National Fish & Wildlife Foundation awarded Oceanside’s water utilities department a $175,000 grant to assist with the city’s Loma Alta Slough wetlands project, officials said Thursday. The project is intended to restore and enhance approximately six acres of coastal wetland and upland habitat near Buccaneer Beach in south Oceanside.

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California Wants Its Imperial Valley to Be ‘Lithium Valley’

/in , , /by /Bloomberg Businessweekby David R. Baker

Dust storms laced with toxins sweep across California’s Imperial County, where mud volcanoes spit and hiss near the shores of the slowly shrinking lake known as the Salton Sea. The county is one of California’s poorest, most of its jobs tied to a thin strip of irrigated land surrounded by desert. San Diego and the Golden State’s prosperous coast lie only 100 miles away across a jumble of mountains, but it might as well be another world.

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Opinion: Our Future Rests on Climate Action

/in , , /by /CalMattrsby Eleni Kounalakis

California is on fire. And the wildfires we’ve seen already this year are not just alarming – they’re a forewarning. In 2020 alone, record temperatures and tens of thousands of dry lightning strikes led our state to experience five of its six largest wildfires in recorded history.

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