MWD’s Colorado River Water Share to Grow : Supplies: Officials caution that the increase and larger deliveries from the state do not dispel the need to continue conservation.

Drought-stressed Southern California water managers got some rare uplifting news Friday as the federal government announced that it would permit the Metropolitan Water District to take more than its annual share of water from the Colorado River.

At the same time, state officials said copious rain and snowfall from March storms will enable them to increase water deliveries to the MWD and other municipal customers by mid-April.

Department of Water Resources officials, who only a month ago cut municipal water deliveries by 90%, said that if the stormy weather continues for the next several weeks deliveries to the MWD could be boosted by as much as 25%.

But the department reported that it still must study rainfall data and survey the snowpack in the Western Sierra before making a firm decision on the amount of water to be released.

While significant, Friday’s developments do not mean Southland residents can begin blithely dousing their dichondra. MWD officials had predicted that the extra Colorado River water would be available and had based their assessment of this year’s supply--as well as the unprecedented cuts made last month to its member agencies--on that assumption.

“We’ve factored in a full (extra supply) of Colorado River water from the start, because we were pretty confident we could persuade the Department of Interior that we can’t do without it,” MWD General Manager Carl Boronkay said.

Additional deliveries of water from the state, Boronkay added, will help. But he said it would probably take a substantial increase in deliveries--like 15%--to prompt him to recommend a relaxation of the overall 50% cut MWD customers will face beginning April 1.

The MWD, Southern California’s water wholesaler, had requested 1.7 million acre-feet from the state this year, but record drought conditions prompted officials in Sacramento to promise only 170,000 acre-feet. With the new projections, the state could supply the district with as much as 595,000 acre-feet for the year. An acre-foot is 326,000 gallons, or the amount of water a typical Los Angeles family of five uses in 18 months.

The Colorado River decision will enable the MWD to take an additional 400,000 acre-feet, U.S. Bureau of Reclamation Commissioner Dennis B. Underwood said. He said the accord provides the MWD with about 1.3 million acre-feet of water--the maximum amount that its Colorado River Aqueduct can physically funnel to Southern California in a year.

At least half the supplemental water diverted by the MWD will come from supplies allocated to Arizona and Nevada but not needed by those states this year. Underwood said he has asked the Imperial Irrigation District, a giant purveyor of water for agriculture in the Imperial Valley, to free another 200,000 acre-feet for MWD use.

The 200,000 acre-feet represents about 7% of the 3 million acre-feet of Colorado River water controlled by the irrigation district, which serves a rich farm belt spanning 500,000 acres.

“It may sound like a lot (of water to give up), but they have an obligation down there to help those areas that are suffering,” Underwood said.

Charles L. Shreves, general manager of the Imperial district, said reducing usage by that amount would be a hardship on farmers, many of whom have already made planting decisions in anticipation of a normal water allocation. Still, he said the district’s board of directors is wrestling with “how we could accomplish something like this and help out the rest of the state.”

State officials said they are able to make additional deliveries because the recent rains have produced heavy runoff into the Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta, allowing water to be pumped south at maximum capacity. However, they said that as promised by Gov. Pete Wilson, the state would not take water from its main storage facility at Lake Oroville on the Feather River.

The state’s announcement came during a hearing by the State Water Resources Control Board, which is considering a request that it temporarily relax salinity standards for the Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta.

Officials estimate that they could save about 350,000 acre-feet this year with relaxed standards, which require the state to ensure that a certain amount of fresh water always flows through the Delta to hold back salt water from San Francisco Bay.

Don Paff, chief of Central Valley Project operations for the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation, said the savings would enable both federal and state agencies to keep more water in storage for the protection of the winter run of Chinook salmon, a unique species now threatened with extinction. For the salmon to survive, water temperatures in spawning grounds in the upper Sacramento River must be maintained at about 56 degrees.