Foundation: State moving too slow on water crisis
| Monday, Jun 01 2009 07:20 PM
Last Updated Monday, Jun 01 2009 07:20 PM
Goals in the Delta
Vision strategic plan
1. Make the co-equal goals of water supply reliability and ecosystem restoration the legal foundation of Delta and water policy making.
2. Recognize and enhance the unique cultural, recreational and agricultural values of the California Delta as an evolving place, an action critical to achieving the co-equal goals.
3. Restore the Delta ecosystem as the heart of a healthy estuary.
4. Promote statewide water conservation, efficiency and sustainable use.
5. Build facilities to improve the existing water conveyance system and expand statewide storage; operate both to achieve the co-equal goals.
6. Reduce risks to people, property and state interests in the Delta by effective emergency preparedness, appropriate land uses and strategic levee investments.
7. Establish a new governance structure with the authority, responsibility, accountability, science support and secure funding to achieve these goals.
View the Delta Vision Foundation report card at http://www.deltavisionfoundation.org/reports.php
Members of a foundation concerned about competing water interests in the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta issued a report Monday that accuses the state of moving too slowly to address a deepening water crisis.
In February 2007, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger created the Delta Vision Blue Ribbon Task Force to come up with recommendations that would lead to a sustainable delta. There isn't enough water to meet environmental, industrial, agricultural and residential water needs.
The task force disbanded after issuing a Delta Vision Strategic Plan in October 2008, but in March 2009 its members regrouped to form the independent Delta Vision Foundation to monitor progress.
Monday, the foundation slammed the state, calling for "a more aggressive, cohesive and integrated approach by the governor and the Legislature."
In the six months since the plan's release, the governor has not responded to the recommendations and strategies it contained even though his cabinet committee reviewed and largely supported them, the foundation charged in a so-called mid-term report card.
"The problems will not go away if you ignore them," said Phil Isenberg, former chairman of the Delta Vision Task Force, after a meeting in Sacramento Monday at which the foundation heard from water system stakeholders and the public.
The governor isn't ignoring them, said Joe Grindstaff, the state's deputy director for water policy and director of the CALFED Bay-Delta Program.
"There's a lot happening, but it's not always the kinds of things that everybody on the outside would see," Grindstaff said. "But (the delta) is something that the governor has been committed to for a long time."
The strategic plan called for investment in infrastructure and better planning to balance the needs of competing interests such as farmers already parched by a drought and environmentalists anxious to protect the delta smelt and other threatened species in the region.
There are at least 16 major bills working their way through the state Legislature that address components of the water system.
Isenberg said he's worried there will be a "30-hour frenzy at the end of the session to hammer out consensus and work out inconsistencies."
Isenberg added that he believes tangible steps can be taken now, despite the state budget crisis, because some of the infrastructure investments could be paid for with revenue bonds paid back by fees on water users, as opposed to general obligation bonds covered by the state's general fund.
A canal that would bypass environmentally fragile areas to deliver water from northern California to the Central Valley is one example. Such a canal has been studied for decades, but never seems to come to fruition.
Grindstaff, too, says the budget need not be a hindrance, at least for some recommendations, and he said work on a portion of the plan will happen this session.
"It's our objective to get agreement on a series of bills this year," he said. "These things needs to be a coordinated effort. Any one of them alone is not enough."
