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With the drought ending for the most part in this part of California, agriculture will have enough water once again to produce its bounty and prove farming is the economic base of the valley. Saying that, many are thinking ahead and bringing about a new and unique water resource project for the west side of Stanislaus County.   I think both the cities of Modesto and Turlock deserve high praise for selling recycled and treated waste water to the water sparse Del Puerto Water District. This is a first for us in this county.

After the wettest winter in 122 years of record-keeping, California’s reservoirs are filling up again, with more than 22 million acre-feet of water in the 46 reservoirs tracked by the state Department of Water Resources (they’d be even fuller if it weren’t for flooding worries at the now-infamous Oroville Dam and several other reservoirs in the Sierra Nevada foothills): The snowpack in the state’s mountains, while it hasn’t quite broken records across the board, currently holds even more water than the reservoirs — about 29 million acre-feet.

For the last five years, Californians have adjusted to a new reality when it comes to water usage. Not much will change now that the drought emergency is officially over. After unprecedented rainfall and the development of a robust Sierra-Cascades snowpack, Gov. Jerry Brown declared an end to the drought emergency on April 7. Brown spoke with caution, stressing that “the next drought could be around the corner.”

A report released today by the Southern California Water Committee and the Committee for Delta Reliability exposes the unintended consequences of nearly two decades of water cuts caused by environmental regulation – showing the hardest hit are those who rely on agriculture to survive, such as farmworkers, food processors, truck drivers and warehouse workers, among many others.

The water spread into every corner of the fields, beckoning wading ibises and egrets as it bathed long rows of sprouting grapevines. Several inches had covered the vineyard ground for a couple of months. But rather than draining it, Don Cameron was pouring more on. “This is not about irrigation,” the sprawling farm’s manager kept telling his quizzical workers. “It’s about recharge. … I want all the water you can get into the grape fields now.” After a drought-busting winter, reservoirs up and down California are dumping water to make room for spring snowmelt.