Water Crisis Demands Action

by Gary Toebben

Water will be a high priority during the Chamber's ACCESS Sacramento trip next week.  The reliable greenery we take for granted in California may be coming to an end without swift action.  

Last week, the California Department of Water Resources conducted its final snowpack survey of the year and found more bare ground than snow. State water officials are now expected to order hundreds of water agencies, farmers and businesses throughout the State to stop diverting water from rivers in which they have longstanding water rights. These looming curtailments and impact they will have on our state economy underscore just how severe the issue of water reliability has become in California.

The current crisis has placed a magnifying glass on how much more water infrastructure is needed throughout the State. In a recent report published by the Public Policy Institute of California, experts found that the State faces a $2-to-$3 billion annual funding gap for critical water infrastructure even if a major water bond is passed by the voters this year.

Gov. Jerry Brown and state lawmakers have demonstrated strong short-term leadership throughout the past year by issuing emergency proclamations asking everyone in the State to reduce water use by 20 percent, enacting legislation to provide communities most impacted by drought with emergency relief, and developing a five-year, comprehensive Water Action Plan to improve the resilience of our state's water infrastructure. But these actions are not enough.

While these steps by Gov. Brown and the Legislature have helped the State manage the drought in the short-term, long-term investments are needed to protect California’s $2 trillion economy. We need to modernize the State Water Project’s 50-year-old conveyance system, enact a comprehensive water bond package that provides sufficient funding for groundwater remediation, storage, and ecosystem restoration, and identify sustainable and equitable funding mechanisms to help implement the governor’s Water Action Plan.

The drought has helped raise public awareness about the unreliability of our state’s natural water supply and our fragile water infrastructure. State policymakers should now capitalize on this window of opportunity and set in place the long-term investments that our state needs. This will help maintain a high quality of life for our residents and a competitive economy that will provide jobs for our citizens and a growing tax base to provide public services for future generations.

And that's The Business Perspective.