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California Water Agency Under Investigation for Discriminating Against Tribes, People of Color

/in , /by /CalMattersby Rachel Becker

The Biden administration’s environmental justice office is investigating whether California’s water agency has discriminated against Native Americans and other people of color by failing to protect the water quality of San Francisco Bay and the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s investigation was triggered by a complaint filed by tribes and environmental justice organizations that says the the state Water Resources Control Board for over a decade “has failed to uphold its statutory duty” to review and update water quality standards in the Bay-Delta.

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Diana Marcum, Pulitzer Prize-Winning Former Reporter for Los Angeles Times, Dies

/in , /by /Los Angeles Timesby James Rainey

Diana Marcum forged a career, and a life, by giving a voice to Californians whom many people didn’t take time to notice. Her favorite subjects were strivers and oddballs, the dispossessed and the people who dared to be delighted in the face of life’s struggles.

The veteran journalist chronicled drought and hunger and deep anxiety from the Central Valley, which she made her home for more than two decades. In even the darkest tales, she usually managed to deliver a ray of light.

Marcum, a former Los Angeles Times reporter who won the 2015 Pulitzer Prize for feature writing, died Wednesday night, according to her friend Janet Sluis. Marcum had a glioblastoma removed from her brain in early July, but fell into a coma shortly after surgery at Fresno Community Regional Medical Center and never fully recovered. She was 60.

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Opinion: California Shouldn’t Block Attempts to Help Struggling Rainbow, Fallbrook Farmers Survive

/in , /by /The San Diego Union-Tribuneby The San Diego Union-Tribune Editorial Board Mentioned: San Diego County Water Authority

For years, farmers in North County have warned they are imperiled by the high rates they have to pay the San Diego County Water Authority. Concerns are particularly acute among avocado growers within the Rainbow Municipal Water District and Fallbrook Public Utility District, where about 600 growers produce about 10 percent of the state’s crop on 5,300 acres.

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LAFCO Dissolves Detachment Advisory Committee

/in , /by /Fallbrook Village Newsby Joe Naiman Mentioned: San Diego County Water Authority

The detachment advisory committee San Diego’s County’s Local Agency Formation Commission created to address issues regarding the proposed detachment of the Fallbrook Public Utility District and the Rainbow Municipal Water District from the San Diego County Water Authority has been dissolved.

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Padre Dam Board Vice President August A. Caires

/in , , /by /Water News Network

Padre Dam Municipal Water District Board Vice President August Caires died August 2 from pancreatic cancer. He was 76 years old.

“Augie served this District and his community with outstanding distinction for nearly 30 years. He was a good friend and colleague to many of us,” said Padre Dam Board President Bill Pommering. “He will be missed greatly.”

Caires led the District as General Manager from 1993 to 2006 and served on Padre Dam’s Board of Directors from 2007 to 2023.

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As Threat of El Niño Winter Looms, Newsom Signs Order to Hasten Levee Repairs

/in , , /by /Los Angeles Timesby Hayley Smith, Ian James, Susanne Rust

As forecasters sound the alarm about another potentially wet California winter fueled by El Niño, Gov. Gavin Newsom is taking urgent but controversial measures to prevent a repeat of the devastating floods that befell the state earlier this year.

An executive order signed by the governor this month will streamline levee repairs and debris removal to help protect and prepare communities for another potential inundation.

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Golf Course Operators Are Teaming Up to Survive Colorado River Water Cuts and a Future That’s Less Green

/in , , /by /CPR Newsby Michael Elizabeth Sakas

Golf professionals and course owners in the Southwest will meet for the first time to discuss how an industry defined by manicured grass can survive climate change, government water cuts and attract players to fairways and greens nourished with less Colorado River water.

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California Moves to Expand Reuse of Wastewater for Drinking

/in , , /by /Axios San Francisco by Shawna Chen

New proposed state regulations would allow cities to pipe highly purified wastewater directly into drinking water supplies.

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Proposed New Water Rules Aim to Mitigate Impact of Vineyards

/in , , /by /Northern California Public Media by Noah Abrams

A state water regulators meeting…not the kind of thing that makes you think “I’ve got to be there.”

But with new environmental rules on the table for vineyards across Sonoma and Mendocino, there was hardly an empty seat to be found at the latest gathering of the North Coast Regional Water Quality Control Board.

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Long-Term Drought and Near-Term Heat Wave Take Toll on Arizona’s Desert Ecology

/in , , /by /NBC Newsby Evan Bush

Frank Reichenbacher worries it will soon be over for his Tumamoc globeberry — a rare Sonoran desert vine that features a fruit that looks like a tiny watermelon and tastes like dirt.

For 41 years, Reichenbacher, an associate researcher at the University of Arizona’s Tumamoc Desert Lab, has followed the same three patches of the rare plants in southern Arizona — including one on Tucson’s Tumamoc Hill.

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