Brown administration cites low snowpack to tout water plan
SACRAMENTO -- Officials in Gov. Jerry Brown’s administration say another dry winter underscores the need for the state to overhaul its water system.
“The security of California’s water supply is threatened,” said Natural Resources Secretary John Laird in an email statement, citing the “urgent need to continue work on the Bay Delta Conservation Plan.”
The snowpack in the Sierra Mountains, the source of the bulk of California’s water supply, is about half of what it should be, according to snow surveying crews.
Brown’s $23.7 billion water plan, first introduced publicly last year, includes the construction of two new massive tunnels that would divert as much as 67,500 gallons of water per second around the Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta in Northern California and bring that water to the southern half of the state.
The plan has spurred bipartisan opposition from environmental groups and farmers who rely on the Delta for water.
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