Droughts, Tunnels & Clean Water: A Conversation on California Water Policy
As printed in Mavens Notebook:
Aerial view looking South along Old River, in the center is Fay Island, part of the Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta in San Joaquin County, California. Photo taken March 08, 2019.
Ken James / California Department of Water Resources
Recently, the Sacramento Press Club hosted a panel discussion on the future of California water featuring Secretary Wade Crowfoot, Metropolitan General Manager Jeff Kightlinger, and State Water Contractors General Manager Jennifer Pierre. The panel was moderated by Stuart Leavenworth.
Secretary Crowfoot began the discussion by stating the Governor Newsom has been pretty clear about his priorities since February’s State of the State address, from which there were three takeaways:
“First, the Governor is prioritizing water as something we need to continue to work on,” said Secretary Crowfoot. “There was a question of whether he would lean in on water, which can be considered a complicated and politicized issue, but he made it clear, water is a priority. Number two, he was clear and direct that he didn’t support the twin tunnel project, the so-called Water Fix project, but that he does support a smaller capacity single tunnel. The third major takeaway was that if our discussions on California water are reduced to a tunnel or no-tunnels, we’re totaling missing the boat. There’s so much that we need to do across the state to prepare our communities and our natural places for the impacts of climate change. That’s really what he talked about in terms of breaking down these binaries, so-called fish versus farms, north versus south, cities versus rural, and really adopting more of a portfolio approach.”
