State officials are expected to fight the Trump administration’s proposal to “maximize water deliveries” through the Central Valley Project to Southern California, including farmers in the Westlands Water District, the largest agricultural water district in the nation, says the Sacramento Bee. “In the end, what’s being discussed is ensuring that people and farmers and farmworkers have water,” said Johnny Amaral, deputy general manager of the water district.
The federal Bureau of Reclamation said in a notice last week that state and federal regulations have “significantly reduced the water available for delivery south of the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta” and that it would “evaluate alternatives that maximize water deliveries.” The Bee said the notice was the “first concrete effort to make good on a promise Donald Trump made while campaigning for the presidency in Fresno, where he vowed to deliver more water to San Joaquin Valley farmers and derided protections for endangered fish species.”
Environmentalists said the proposal violates a federal law that gives equal weight to fish and wildlife in the operation of the Central Valley Project. The state’s endangered species law also could provide a lever for opponents of the plan. The proposal arrived at a crucial moment for the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta, “the nexus of California’s complicated north-to-south water delivery system,” said the Bee. Gov. Jerry Brown’s $17 billion twin-tunnel project, to move water beneath the delta, is short of funding. “Brown says the tunnels, by rerouting how water flows through the estuary, would help solve never-ending conflicts between fish and water supplies. As it stands now, the pumps are often restricted in order to protect Delta smelt and other endangered fish species, allowing more water to flow out to the ocean.”