A daily compilation for DWR personnel of significant news articles and comment
October 25, 2007
1. Top Item
With draft, Delta vision takes shape; Housing restrictions, new aqueduct and reservoirs part of recommendations that could go to governor
Contra Costa Times – 10/25/07
By Mike Taugher, staff writer
The Delta's ecosystem should not be treated as an afterthought and water managers should expect to get less Delta water in the future, according to a high-level commission.
In a draft report being considered today and Friday, the Delta Vision Blue Ribbon Task Force also recommends the state impose strict limits on new housing in the region's floodplains and that it build new reservoirs and an aqueduct to deliver water from Northern California to the south.
But with the state's thirst on a collision course with the Delta's faltering ecosystem, the panel's bedrock conclusion is that the needs of water agencies can no longer trump environmental concerns.
"The history of the Delta has been to secure water supplies first and then worry about environmental mitigation later," the panel's latest set of draft recommendations says, noting that such an approach is a recipe for "endless volatility and conflict, to no one's benefit."
After record high water deliveries out of the Delta -- and crashing fish populations -- that volatility and conflict is on the rise.
Next year, for example, the amount of water pumped from the Delta into canals heading into the
Environmentalists say the cost to the water supply will be much less.
Panel members will meet in
Among the highlights contained in the latest draft:
- "
- "(The Delta) is not solely an infrastructure system or an ecosystem. The Delta is a place of natural beauty, valued first by Native Americans. It has a regional economy and a regional culture as old as any in
- "Reducing reliance on the Delta means building greater regional self-sufficiency throughout
- "New storage, both in ground and above ground, and improved conveyance must be constructed to capture water when least damaging to the environment and efficiently move it to areas of need. Building new conveyance alone, without new storage, would seriously compromise the ability to protect the estuary and provide sufficient environmental flows."
- New housing should be sharply restricted in the Delta for several reasons: putting new homes in floodplains is risky and increases the state's liability; new superlevees that are built to protect new developments increase pressure on levees in surrounding areas that may already be developed; and the periphery of the Delta, where development pressure is highest, is also the area that is most likely to be needed as a right-of-way for a new aqueduct, should one be built.
"There's a lot of good things in here," said Barry Nelson, a water policy analyst at the Natural Resources Defense Council. "A lot of these are issues that the agencies have been ducking for a long time."
The draft report echoes a conviction that has grown in strength this year that the water supply of the Delta must be physically separated from the region's wildlife habitat.
That can be done in a couple of ways, one of which would be to build a highly controversial aqueduct such as the
Another idea gaining interest is the installation of rock dams in various Delta channels to isolate environmentally valuable channels in the western Delta from the effects of water pumping. That configuration, if it works, could be used in combination with a smaller peripheral canal.
The latest draft does not specify a favored approach or identify specific sites for new dams or reservoirs.
Laura King Moon, assistant general manager of the State Water Contractors, said the draft is on the right track but added, "it is time ... to move beyond generalities and to acknowledge the need for a new dual diversion and conveyance system" to move water around the Delta.
The Delta Vision task force, appointed in February by Schwarzenegger, is an independent panel of seven experts. Its recommendations are nonbinding but could be used by the governor in crafting a new policy for the Delta.
Its members include:
- Phil Isenberg, a lobbyist and former mayor of
- Sunne Wright McPeak, a former
- Raymond Seed, a levee expert and professor of civil and environmental engineering at UC Berkeley
- Richard Frank, executive director of the
-
- Monica Florian, a planner and former executive with the Irvine Company
- Thomas McKernan, CEO of the Automobile Club of
The Delta Vision plan is one of several extensive studies under way to chart a new course in the Delta. Another is a plan under development by regulators and water agencies that would protect endangered species while stabilizing water supplies. Dueling ballot initiatives are in the works to deal with the Delta and state water problems.
IF YOU GO
The meeting begins at 10 a.m. today at the West Sacramento City Hall Galleria,
No comments:
Post a Comment