President Donald Trump’s recent order to release water from reservoirs into California’s Central Valley had no direct impact on San Diego. But the new administration will be overseeing negotiations that will determine the future of a main source of the county’s water: the Colorado River.
It’s anybody’s guess whether Trump’s unpredictable nature and penchant for unorthodox power moves — as he just exhibited — will be a factor.
Even in San Diego, it’s typical to get some rain in the winter. Except this year, the San Diego County Water Authority said it’s the third driest start to the rainy season in 150 years.
The 40 million people who rely on the Colorado River will continue to wait for a long-term plan for its management as negotiations between the seven states in the river basin remain stalled.
An unusual idea floated by the president of the Utah State Senate to get more shares of Colorado River water is intriguing California water officials. Utah’s Department of Natural Resources
The San Diego County Water Authority announced a new multi-agency agreement this week that will save local water customers $20 million while protecting Colorado River supplies.
An unusual idea floated by the president of the Utah State Senate to get more shares of Colorado River water is intriguing California water officials.
In an interview with FOX 13 News in May, Senate President J. Stuart Adams, R-Layton, proposed a novel idea: “We actually build desalination plants in California and trade them for the Colorado River water.”
For the second year in a row, the San Diego County Water Authority and its partners have struck a deal to conserve water in Lake Mead, support the long-term sustainability of the Colorado River and save local ratepayers money.
The agreements between the Water Authority, the Imperial Irrigation District, and the Metropolitan Water District, with funding from the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation, are designed to promote voluntary water conservation. The 2024 agreement was announced during a meeting of the Colorado River Board of California at this year’s Colorado River Water Users Association’s conference in Las Vegas.
As a part of these deals, the Water Authority agreed to leave 50,000 acre-feet of water from its Quantification Settlement Agreement supplies in the Colorado River, helping California meet federal conservation goals.
The 2023 agreement between the three parties was the first of its kind. The 2024 deal will save San Diego County ratepayers approximately $20 million, which will be applied to 2026 wholesale water rates.
“For the second year in a row, the Water Authority and its partners have struck a deal to conserve water in Lake Mead and save our local ratepayers approximately $20 million,” said Water Authority Board Chair Nick Serrano. “This is a win-win for all of us and demonstrates how the Water Authority is strategically using its assets to help protect ratepayers and the Colorado River through innovative thinking.”
The Water Authority’s efforts are part of a larger commitment by California water users to protect the overtaxed Colorado River, including plans to save at least 400,000 more acre-feet in 2025 after conserving more than 1.2 million acre-feet over the last two years.
“It is really a model partnership and collaboration between states and local entities and the federal government,” said U.S. Bureau of Reclamation Commissioner M. Camille Calimlim Touton.
California’s efforts have led to the equivalent of 16 feet of water being added to Lake Mead in two years, providing much-needed stability to the entire river system as the seven Basin states work with the federal government to create a post-2026 operations plan for the river.
“Our collective achievements not only have made a profound impact on Lake Mead today, they also illustrate the can-do spirit that the Water Authority and our partners bring to future conservation work on the river,” said Colorado River Board Vice Chair and Water Authority Director Jim Madaffer. “We are both proud of what we have accomplished and committed to delivering additional solutions for the Southwest in the years ahead.”
The Colorado River Basin is the most important water source in the West, providing water for more than 40 million people and generating hydropower in seven U.S. states.
The Water Authority will continue to pursue other water transfers and exchanges to maximize the value of San Diego County’s water resources and minimize the cost to local ratepayers. Those steps include budget cuts, project deferrals, debt refinancing, increasing grant funds and restructuring rates.
The people who will determine the future of the Colorado River said they do not anticipate major changes to their negotiation process as a result of former president Donald Trump’s return to the White House.
Multiple officials from states that use the Colorado River pointed to historical precedent and said that similar negotiations in the past were largely unaffected by turnover in presidential administrations. Historically, state leaders have written the particulars of river management rules, and the federal Bureau of Reclamation implements the states’ ideas.
The morning temperature is nearing 100 degrees Fahrenheit as Keith Seaman sweats beneath his bucket hat, walking door to door through the cookie-cutter blocks of a subdivision in Casa Grande, Arizona. Seaman, a Democrat who represents this Republican-leaning area in the state’s House of Representatives, is trying to retain a seat he won by a margin of around 600 votes just two years ago.
He wants to know what issues matter most to his constituents, but most of them don’t answer the door, or they say they’re too busy to talk. Those that do answer tend to mention standard campaign issues like rising prices and education — which Seaman, a former public school teacher, is only too happy to discuss.
The Biden administration has told Colorado River negotiators it no longer plans to issue its draft set of plans for managing the waterway in December, leaving the next major move in the battle over the West’s most important river to the next president.
The federal plans for the waterway are of increasing importance since the seven states that share it are deadlocked over new rules to govern the river after 2026. The Interior Department’s Bureau of Reclamation had said for months that it intended to issue them as part of a draft environmental impact statement at the end of the year.
