Public Consensus Vital to Expansion of Water Distribution in State, Officials Say

California will get a state water distribution project only when there is a public consensus to build one, state and local officials told representatives of regional water agencies on Wednesday.

Interests seeking an additional water distribution system must bridge the regional differences that killed prior proposals and must give competing groups a voice in the decision-making process, officials said at the spring conference of the Assn. of California Water Agencies in Anaheim.

Not Good Year for a Bill

It is not a north-south issue, nor one of urban interests versus agriculture nor environmental issues versus urban growth, said David Schuster, manager of the association of state water contracting agencies. “This is probably not a good year to come back with a new state water bill,” Schuster said, referring to last year’s defeat of the governor’s proposal for a new statewide water project and the 1982 defeat of the Peripheral Canal ballot measure.

Schuster said water contracting agencies and water management officials throughout the state are aware of the water supply and storage problems. And farmers across the state and residents in some Northern California counties are painfully aware of the drought California suffered in 1978.

“But the public didn’t see it that way,” Schuster said. “Our credibility was hurt on whether we really needed the water or not.”

Schuster, an aide to a state assemblyman, and Supervisors Harriett Wieder of Orange County and Sunny McPeak of Contra Costa County, said work must be done to bring the various opposing interests together to talk. Environmental groups and Northern Californians criticized Southern California for wasting water. Farming interests were unhappy at being bypassed under various projects. And the Sacramento Delta and San Francisco Bay Area residents were unhappy that their environmental problems were not solved by prior plans.

‘Must Address Criticisms’

“We must address these criticisms and the water community must focus in on these issues,” said Bob Reeb, a consultant to the Assembly Water, Parks and Wildlife Committee, and aide to Assemblyman Jim Costa (D-Fresno).

Reeb said there must be a coordinated approach to deliver surplus water to Southern California, to clean up the Sacramento Delta and to deal with agricultural drainage problems in the Central Valley and Imperial and Riverside county areas. Moreover, Reeb said, there must be a concerted statewide effort for water conservation, and the public must be educated to understand that regions within the state are interdependent.

Asked how a consensus could be built when Northern Californians rejected the 1982 ballot measure by an overwhelming 90%, and Southern Californians were largely uninformed about the water issue, McPeak said:

“The grass-roots feeling about water in Northern California is even deeper than I anticipated. We have to have the public involved in resolving these water issues.”

McPeak said it would be “foolhardy” to resurrect similar proposals voted down at either the ballot box or in the state Legislature, she said. The proposals to build canals that would bypass the San Joaquin Valley would simply have made the bay area off the Delta “the sewer of the state,” she said.

By the same token, McPeak said, Northern Californians have to recognize the needs of water contracting agencies, of Southern Californians and of farmers. She said her committee has proposed a three-point plan to bring to discussions on a new state water distribution project.

Improved Protection

The plan calls for improved protections for the bay and Delta regions before any increase in water exports; for conservation and more efficient use of existing water supplies and development and construction of water projects that are both environmentally safe and economically sound.

“Northern Californians know what they are against; we (Southern Californians) don’t know what we are for,” said Wieder, referring to apparent public apathy on the water project issue.

She said Southern California is projected to grow by 3 million people in the next 15 years, requiring additional water supplies at a time when a U.S. Supreme Court decision has limited California’s access to water from the Colorado River.

Wieder said the issue is one of statewide economic importance.

“Southern Californians don’t complain that our gas taxes go towards building bridges and roads in Northern California because we realize we are all one state,” Wieder said.

She said the Southern California Water Committee Inc., a nonprofit coalition of business, government and water agency interests from eight Southern California counties, is working now to educate the editorial boards of newspapers, television and radio stations. She said efforts are under way to educate the general public as well.

Moderator Raymond Corley Jr., a legislative representative for the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California said, “We must build a consensus for when that political window of opportunity opens. When? Who knows?”

McPeak said she has observed in recent months that water contractors are talking about water quality issues for the first time and other groups are discussing Southern California’s need and agriculture’s need for additional water supplies.

“I believe we are closer to solving our water problem than we have ever been before in this state,” McPeak said.