After recently approving the Bay Area’s first widespread restrictions on water customers amid worsening drought conditions, officials with the Marin Municipal Water District will vote Tuesday on imposing more.
While drought conditions are upon the Bay Area, water officials in Santa Clara County plan to draw from distant reserves for now and seek to increase storage and expand water recycling in the future.
Half of the water in Santa Clara County comes from somewhere else, sometimes hundreds of miles away.
There is dry dirt where water should be at Folsom Lake. A lack of wet weather is taking a toll on the state’s water supply.
Chris Orrock is a spokesperson for the California Department of Water Resources. He said while drought-like conditions are very common for the state, this year is worse than normal, especially considering back-to-back dry winters with little snow and rain.
“In fact, this year is a critically dry year,” Orrock said.
It is so dry, in fact, that DWR canceled Thursday’s snow survey at Phillips Station because there was not enough snow on the ground. Orrock said much of the lower elevation snow is already gone and some of the higher elevation snow is beginning to melt as well.
Stunning drone photographs of Lake Oroville help illustrate the drought emergency declared by Gov. Gavin Newsom in two Northern California counties. Water levels at Lake Oroville have dropped to 42% of its 3,537,577 acre foot capacity.
Conditions are particularly acute in Mendocino and Sonoma counties because the local water supply depends on rainfall in the Russian River watershed.
In what amounted to a routine request for more information, the clerk of the United States Supreme Court requested the Imperial Irrigation District to file a response to Michael Abatti’s petition for certiorari on Monday, April 26, according to a press release.
The following day, the Imperial County Farm Bureau issued a press release incorrectly suggesting that the US Supreme Court is concerned that the California Appellate Court’s ruling on the Abatti case would deprive Imperial Valley residents of water.
Among other things, the Farm Bureau’s statement and brief filed with the court suggested that Imperial Valley’s water rights are property rights enjoyed by those who own agricultural land and described doomsday scenario consequences if the Supreme Court does not intervene to create private property rights to water where none exist, according to the release.
Millions of young salmon raised at fish hatcheries in the Central Valley will be trucked to San Francisco Bay and other coastal sites for release, because the rivers they’d normally travel to get to the ocean are drying up, state and federal officials said Wednesday.
Three more big Bay Area water agencies are calling on residents to conserve water as drought looms in California following two consecutive extraordinarily dry winters.
Board members with both the East Bay Municipal Utility District and Sonoma Water approved proclamations Tuesday to declare drought emergencies.
Federal dollars are on the table to help farmers and ranchers during the drought. The U.S. Department of Agriculture declared a drought disaster in 50 California counties last month. Grants are now available to help with costs associated with the dry conditions.
Bracing for expanding drought conditions and dwindling local water supply, the Nevada Irrigation District Board of Directors proclaimed a drought emergency throughout the District’s service area, which includes portions of Nevada, Placer, Yuba counties. The declaration was made during the Board’s April 28 meeting.
In what may become an iconic image for drought-stricken California, Gov. Gavin Newsom stood on the parched bed of Lake Mendocino on April 21 to announce an emergency declaration for Sonoma and Mendocino counties.
