Environmentalists Hit State Plan on Water Allocations
Environmentalists on Tuesday hammered a state plan to revamp the process by which it will reallocate water from the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta, roughly two-thirds of the state’s fresh water.
The new process would govern the San Francisco Bay-Delta hearings, a years-long analysis that resulted last fall in a recommendation to cap water exports from Northern California to Southern California.
Several powerful water agencies opposed that idea, which might have limited urban growth and agriculture. They persuaded the State Water Resources Control Board to design a new Bay-Delta hearings process.
Environmentalists blasted that process Tuesday for stressing existing water rights while inhibiting a far-reaching reallocation of water resources.
Environmentalists said the process is legally suspect because it assumes reallocation is the last resort, judges proposals under a vague “reasonableness” standard and permits new water exports even as the board is supposed to be debating export reductions.
The board is scheduled to vote June 22 on the proposed new process.
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