Press-Telegram (Long Beach)

State has a new plan for the Delta

- By Da■ Walters

California's water warriors have a new arena for their perpetual conflict over the allocation of the state's ever-evolving supply — a nearly 6,000-word proposal from the state Water Resources Control Board.

The draft essentiall­y calls for sharp reductions in diversions from the Sacramento River and its tributarie­s to allow more water to flow through the environmen­tally troubled Sacramento­San Joaquin Delta.

“It is a consequent­ial effort,” Eric Oppenheime­r, chief deputy director of the board, said during a media briefing on what is technicall­y an update of the agency's management plan for the Delta and San Francisco Bay. “It reflects years of scientific analysis that we've undertaken and years of public input.”

The board had previously issued a similar policy paper for the San Joaquin River and its tributarie­s. The two rivers merge to form the Delta, a vast maze of islands and channels that is the West Coast's largest estuary. In addition to upstream diversions to irrigate fields and orchards and serve municipal users, federal and state projects pump water from the Delta's southern edge into aqueducts for transfer to San Joaquin Valley farms and homes as far south as San Diego.

The reduction of natural flows through the Delta have, scientists say, increased its salinity and otherwise made it unable to adequately support salmon and other wildlife.

The battle over the Delta has raged for decades with environmen­tal groups, lately joined by American Indian tribes, pressing the water board impose reductions on diversions, and water users seeking to protect their supplies.

There are two conflicts: how much additional flows are needed to restore the Delta and how any reduction in diversions would be framed and enforced. The water board's new draft provides some additional focus on both, but doesn't provide any solid direction.

For the better part of a decade, two governors, Jerry Brown and Gavin Newsom, have promoted the concept of “voluntary agreements” to reduce diversions, hoping to avoid a headon political and legal collision.

“We want to thank Gov. Newsom for his continued leadership and commitment to using collaborat­ive voluntary agreements between water users and public agencies to support water quality and fish population­s throughout the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta,” Farm Bureau president Jamie Johansson said in response to the new plan.

However, the water agencies have offered, much smaller reductions than the water board says are necessary to improve habitat.

The environmen­tal coalitions demanding larger reductions see the voluntary agreements as subterfuge­s to maintain the status quo and have pressed the board to simply set reduction numbers and enforce them by decree. Imposing reductions would touch off a legal battle that Brown and Newsom have wanted to avoid because it would hinge on water rights, some of which date back to the late 19th century.

Environmen­talists contend that those rights are anachronis­ms in the 21st century and should be set aside to give authoritie­s the ability to allocate water rationally, particular­ly since climate change is affecting precipitat­ion and thus the overall water supply.

However, when the water board tested its authority visà-vis ordering diversion reductions from senior water rights holders, it lost in court. Moreover, legislatio­n that would have provided such authority didn't make it through the Legislatur­e this year. The water board's new draft may provide more grist for debate, but it does not resolve the fundamenta­l conflicts.

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