Californians fought the urge to take long showers and generally slosh water around after all the rainfall this year, cutting water use instead by 26.1 percent in April, state officials said Monday.
Residents and businesses in San Diego County and around the state continued to save large amount of waters in April, even as regulators have eased a mandate for cutting back on urban water use — and are poised to eliminate such targets altogether for many water districts in coming weeks.
State officials reported Monday that water use in California dropped by an average of 26.1 percent in April compared with the same month in 2013, the benchmark year set by Gov. Jerry Brown’s emergency water conservation order. That program began in June, got eased in March and is being downscaled again.
Californians continued to save water in April despite the easing of the drought, reducing use by about 26 percent compared to 2013, the State Water Resources Control Board said Monday.
The reductions came before the recent roll back of harsh mandatory conservation targets. They also came during a relatively dry April. Sacramento received about 1.5 inches of rain during that month. Los Angeles saw about 0.3 inches. Water savings ranged from 23 percent along the south coast to about 33 percent in the San Joaquin valley, state data show. Water districts in the Sacramento River watershed cut use by 31 percent.
San Diego County farmers, ranchers and businesses may seek some relief from the drought through two loan programs.
Eligible farmers and ranchers of “family-sized” farming operations may apply for a U.S. Department of Agriculture disaster loan for physical damage and crop production loss that has occurred since Jan. 1, 2016. The maximum disaster loan amount is $500,000.
The deadline to apply for the disaster loan is Nov. 2.
To apply, famers need to contact the Farm Service Agency by phone at (661) 336-0967, ext. 2 or by mail at 5000 California Ave., Suite 100, Bakersfield, CA 93309.
Touching down in Fresno one week ago, Donald Trump offered a standard Republican critique of California’s water shortage – that it is, as legions of roadside banners here proclaim, the “man-made” result of environmental policies restricting water flows.
Then he barreled further, declaring “there is no drought.”
But if exaggeration is Trump’s style, Hillary Clinton’s would appear to be avoidance.
The Democratic presidential frontrunner, campaigning in Fresno on Saturday, localized her longstanding criticism of Trump’s plan to deport undocumented immigrants living in the United States, pledging to make sure “that 1.2 million farmworkers in California will not be rounded up and deported.”
The California Senate approved two water measures by Sen. Lois Wolk, D-Davis, last week, including legislation to protect California’s aquifers and groundwater resources from permanent damage due to overdraft. Both bills will head to the Assembly next.
The Senate voted 21-17 to support Senate Bill 1317, which addresses a sharp increase in groundwater extraction through new and deeper drilling across the state during the drought, including water basins currently in critical overdraft.
The San Diego County Water Authority has released a succinct yet engaging new documentary series that highlights the major events in the San Diego region’s ongoing quest for safe and reliable water supplies. Available at www.sdcwa.org/quench-thirst-documentary-series-highlights-regions-water-history and based on the book “To Quench a Thirst: A Brief History of Water in the San Diego Region,” the three-part video series provides a 13-minute overview that traces the search for water from the region’s indigenous people through generations of area leaders who developed the region’s diversified water supply portfolio and robust infrastructure that today sustains 3.2 million people and a $218 billion economy.
The vaunted “Delta Plan,” which took the Delta Stewardship Council about four years to write, has been largely trashed in court in a decision by Sacramento Superior Court Judge Michael Kenny.
Four lawsuits filed by local water agencies, Delta farmers, environmental groups, property owners in the Discovery Bay area and others succeeded in their arguments that the plan falls short of what is required by state law.
It is easy to assume seawater desalination is the answer to California’s long-term water woes. All you have to do is look west, and the vast Pacific Ocean simply glimmers with opportunity.
But as with so many things involving water, desalination is not that simple. Converting seawater into drinking water is very expensive, it consumes a lot of electricity and it comes with a host of potentially unsavory environmental impacts.
With a Southern California water district’s purchase of 20,000 acres in the Delta expected to become official as soon as next week, San Joaquin County and central Delta farmers have erected one more legal hurdle in an effort to stop the deal. They filed suit in Contra Costa County Superior Court, alleging that the terms of the sale are in violation of an earlier legal agreement that contains rules about how the land can be used.
