Water
Water
from winter storms is the lifeblood of California, and the state’s
reservoirs, rivers, and canals provide the heart and circulation system that
keep our towns, farms, and factories alive during the rainless months of
summer and fall. It is essential for water be available in amounts and at
locations that provide for both existing uses and the demands of growth. This
will require both conservation and development of new supplies.
My
family’s experience with shifting from furrow irrigation to sprinkler,
dripper, and mister systems is an example of agriculture’s long history of
working to conserve water. But even with conservation, past droughts have
clearly shown that available water storage capacity is not always adequate to
meet even past demands. And considering how much has already been done to
conserve water and the inadequacy of existing storage capacity in dry years,
it is obvious that growing urban demands and diversions to meet requirements
for fish, wildlife, and other environmental uses will not be met without
developing new sources of water supply. The recent controversy over water for
farmers or fish in the Klamath Basin provides a real life example, and warning, of how
sudden and serious this problem can be. Groundwater storage can help, but is
limited by both availability of suitable recharge areas and recharge rates.
So the development of new in-stream and off-stream surface storage facilities
is essential to meet current and future water needs. The Cal Fed program was supposed to address
this problem, but has so far done little to increase supply
.
In
addition, the large winter storms in 1997 and 1986 (when levees broke near
Marysville and a few more hours of rain would have led to a catastrophic
flood in the Sacramento area) have clearly demonstrated the need for
additional upstream and downstream flood protection. Accomplishing this will
require both leadership and a realistic understanding of watershed and
environmental processes that my background and experience can bring to the
State Legislature.
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