March 6, 2015
CapitalPress.com
7
Farms to lose federal water again
By TIM HEARDEN
Capital Press
Courtesy California Department of
Water Resources
Water levels were low at San
Luis Reservoir in Gustine, Ca-
lif., during the severe drought,
Aug. 19, 2014. The reservoir
holds 627,000 acre-feet more
water than it did at this time a
year ago.
Water
Project
boosts
allocation
By TIM HEARDEN
Capital Press
SACRAMENTO — Ear-
ly-season storms will enable
the State Water Project to
increase its anticipated deliv-
eries from 15 percent to 20
percent, the agency has an-
nounced.
Abundant rainfall in early
December and for a few days in
mid-February enabled the state
Department of Water Resourc-
es to send water to the San Luis
Reservoir south of the Sacra-
mento-San Joaquin River Delta
to serve customers during dry
months.
The reservoir near Los
Banos, Calif., holds 627,000
acre-feet more water than it did
at this time a year ago, so state
water managers will be able to
leave water in Lake Oroville in
case the drought persists late
this year and into 2016, offi-
cials explained.
“We’re able to go up a bit
… because of the storms in De-
cember and February,” DWR
spokesman Ted Thomas said.
“It’s kind of an important thing
to note that the reason we are
confident we can deliver 20
percent is we took advantage of
the runoff from the two storm
systems to pump water into
San Luis Reservoir south of the
Delta.”
The state increase comes as
many farmers who rely on fed-
eral Central Valley Project have
learned they will likely get none
again this year. The U.S. Bu-
reau of Reclamation must con-
tend with a more complicated
step-ladder of senior and junior
water rights, whereas the state
can make across-the-board al-
locations to its 29 water-district
contractors, Thomas said.
“They are delivering a sub-
stantial amount of water” to
senior rights-holders along the
Sacramento and San Joaquin
rivers, Thomas said. “They’re
not at a zero allocation for ev-
eryone.”
In all, the DWR expects to
deliver 840,000 acre-feet of
the nearly 4.2 million acre-feet
requested by contractors, the
agency explained in a news re-
lease. A 20 percent allocation
would be the second-lowest
since 1991, when agricultural
customers of the project got a
zero allocation and municipal
customers received 30 percent,
according to the DWR.
Last year the state delivered
just 5 percent of requested wa-
ter to contractors after allocat-
ing as much as 80 percent three
years earlier.
“We
welcome
the
much-needed, modest increase
in water supplies,” State Water
Contractors general manager
Terry Erlewine said in a state-
ment. “The severe multi-year
drought has created a water
supply deficit that will not be
easy to close, and we need to
capture what we can before
winter is over.”
The DWR made its an-
nouncement March 2 as rain
was still falling in some parts
of the state after a weekend sys-
tem that brought heavy down-
pours to Southern California,
light showers in the Central
Valley and 12 to 18 inches of
snow in the Sierra Nevada.
Thomas said the state’s al-
location could increase again if
forecasts for a wet March prove
true, although he doesn’t think
an increase is likely.
“I don’t see them (alloca-
tions) improving but we’re
still hoping they will,” he said.
“We’ve had significant pre-
cipitation in March in years
past. Right at this moment it
doesn’t appear promising but
we’re hoping things change.”
SACRAMENTO — Many
farms in California’s Central
Valley will have to do with-
out federal water again this
year unless big spring storms
replenish the state’s woeful
mountain snowpack.
The U.S. Bureau of Rec-
lamation’s initial allocation,
announced Feb. 27, set aside
no water for agricultural land
without senior water rights ei-
ther north or south of the Sac-
ramento-San Joaquin River
Delta as the snowpack remains
less than 20 percent of normal.
Cities will get enough water
to meet their health and safety
needs or at least 25 percent
of normal supplies, whichev-
er is greater, and the bureau
will meet with Friant Division
contractors to determine what
amount of water they’ll need
for health and safety.
“Today’s picture is not a
pretty one,” bureau Mid-Pa-
cific Regional Director Davis
Murillo told reporters in a con-
ference call, adding that offi-
cials are bracing for a fourth
straight year of drought.
“The rain events in Decem-
ber were encouraging, but the
persistently dry weather (since
then) underscores our need to
plan for another critical year of
drought,” he said.
Tim Hearden/Capital Press
An irrigation canal sends Central Valley Project water to farms
near Red Bluff, Calif., in the spring of 2014. The U.S. Bureau of
Reclamation has announced its initial allocations of project water
for the coming year.
Senior water rights hold-
ers along the Sacramento and
San Joaquin rivers will receive
some water but their alloca-
tions will be reduced, officials
said. Last year they ended up
with about 65 percent of their
normal supplies.
In a dry year, senior rights
holders must receive at least
75 percent of their contract
amounts before more junior
users begin receiving water.
The water sent to senior con-
tractors is determined by levels
in Shasta Lake, which was at
57 percent of capacity and 79
percent of normal as of Feb.
26.
Officials noted that con-
ditions could improve with
nearly two months remaining
in California’s rainy season,
perhaps prompting increased
supplies to urban users and po-
tentially some water available
for farms.
“This is our initial alloca-
tion based on what we know
today,” said Pablo Arroyave,
the bureau’s regional deputy
manager. “We certainly hope
that conditions will improve
and the hydrology gets to av-
erage or above average in the
next few months.”
But the zero-water alloca-
tion was no surprise to growers
who’ve been facing the sinking
feeling that water shutoffs that
hampered their crops last year
would be repeated because of
the meager snowpack.
Farmers in the Westlands
Water District who left thou-
sands of acres unplanted or
irrigated by pumping scarce
ground water last summer
know they’ll have to make the
same tough choices this year,
district spokeswoman Gayle
Holeman told The Associated
Press.
Still, California Citrus Mu-
tual blasted the bureau’s an-
nouncement, complaining that
“a massive amount” of water
has been transferred away
from entities south of the delta
with no accountability for how
changes in water usage have
been made.
“We think the state and fed-
eral agencies and administra-
tions have a policy that essen-
tially destroys the food supply,”
CCM president Joel Nelsen
told the Capital Press. “We’ve
got to be the only state and na-
tion on earth setting policies
that do that.”
Nelsen said about 50,000
acres in the state’s prime cit-
rus belt in Fresno, Kings and
Tulare counties have no access
to ground water. Some of them
have been able to purchase wa-
ter at $1,200 to $1,400 an acre-
foot — which is 12 to 14 times
higher than it was before the
drought — but “I don’t know if
they’ll be able to find that water
(in the future), nor could they
afford that water,” he said.
California Farm Bureau
Federation president Paul
Wenger asserts the announce-
ment reinforces the need to
move quickly on water projects
authorized by Proposition 1,
the $7.5 billion water bond that
passed in November, and on
congressional reform of envi-
ronmental laws.
“The CVP announcement
is both saddening and madden-
ing,” Wenger said in a state-
ment. “It’s saddening because
the continued cutoff of water
will prolong the impact of wa-
ter shortages on farmers, their
employees and rural commu-
nities. It’s maddening because
California still struggles to
manage water wisely and flex-
ibly, especially in dry years.”
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