State and Local Water Policies Will Have to Mesh Somehow –
State and Local Water Policies Will Have to Mesh Somehow – The local option basically amounts to the city upgrading their current facility at a price of at least $100 million. The regional option, in which we partner with Woodland, amounts to us paying Woodland in part to upgrade theirs.
Following last week’s Vanguard story on the obstacles that lay ahead for the city’s water supply project, we talked extensively to local leaders. From those discussions, we were able to glean a number of interesting, if contradictory, facts.
First, staff does not appear to be taking the protests or issues involving potential conflicts with the Delta Flow Criteria very seriously. Most believe that the state will have little choice but to honor the “area-of-origin diversions,” even though the entire Delta is going to be strained to the breaking point by continued and increase extractions from local entities.
Second, it appears that perhaps as soon as the week after Thanksgiving, we will have extensive information from the Joint Powers Authority on their findings, which have been based on talks with a range of water experts.
From the information I have received, local water experts and our local government leaders still expect to get their water application approved and they will then move forward on their project that will likely cost a quarter to half a billion for both projects.
The city believes that it has already raised sewer rates sufficiently to mitigate future increases, but the same is likely not true for water rates.
Nevertheless, I believe local officials should be much less sanguine about long term prospects than they are.
I say this for a number of different reasons. First, the state is serious about a conveyance system from the Delta to Southern California.
Second, the state is going to run roughshod over the rights of local communities and environmental interests to do so.
At some point, they have to address a key issue that will not be addressed in the upcoming Bay Delta Conversation Plan which is: how will we be able to export the amount of water that Southern California wants while protecting the environment – specifically fish and habitat?
This is all unsettled. We have not passed state laws to deal with these conflicting goals. The political leaders in the state, sensing it was the wrong year, punted on a multibillion dollar water bond that would have produced a peripheral canal.
That leaves us with a good deal of uncertainty.
And our local leaders have not addressed critical local questions any better. The first problem is, how much water will the Sacramento River produce for Davis? There are suggestions that during the dry months, the city may get very little water from the river. Further problems would exist during dry years.
While state water models vary under conditions of global warming, the fact remains that it is, at the very least, likely to produce more variability even if the average rainfall stays the same or increases. That means more flooding and more drought, which begs the question – where do we get the water when the state water is not available?
If the answer is the current ground wells, we run into the same effluent discharge problems as before. If the answer is we purchase water, say, from Conaway Ranch, it introduces a whole new set of problems and complications.
Will reports that come out in the coming weeks resolve these questions or just create new ones? It is hard to know. But one thing is clear: we are in the process of approving multimillions in bonds before we know what the state water and delta policies are going to be.
That is a huge gamble on the part of our city leadership. At some point, that may come around to bite us all in the pocketbook.
—David M. Greenwald reporting
I would suggest that our City start with the issue of secure water rights over the next 50 years. Our first priority should be to go with a project that works under a variety of scenarios. Water will become much scarcer and any policy that doesn’t address that central fact is flawed.
Has anyone looked at water conservation? Irvine California (that’s right in Republican Orange County) has a progressive water policy which recycles some waste water. I am sure there are many things we could do in Davis to reduce water use. WE have low flow toilets and showers in newer developments but that seems to be about all. During the summer most of us are watering our lawns–in an area where it makes no sense to have lawns. I am not suggesting anything draconian but could the City encourage people somehow to move away from wasteful practices?
Do we need these water plants now? Is there an advantage to waiting?
I don’t know why you fail to understand that as long as the treated water is returned upstream of the delta we are talking about little water being lost from the Delta watershed. The real issues are water quality and cost not water rights.
dmg: “Nevertheless, I believe local officials should be much more sanguine about long term prospects than they are.”
Much LESS sanguine?
dmg: “The city believes that it has already raised sewer rates sufficiently to mitigate future increases, but the same is likely not true for water rates.”
My understanding is sewer rates will continue to increase over the next ten years. Has something new happened that I don’t know about?
dmg: “First, staff does not appear to be taking the protests or issues involving potential conflicts with the Delta Flow Criteria very seriously. Most believe that the state will have little choice but to honor the “area-of-origin diversions,” even though the entire Delta is going to be strained to the breaking point by continued and increase extractions from local entities….
At some point, they have to address a key issue that will not be addressed in the upcoming Bay Delta Conversation Plan which is: how will we be able to export the amount of water that Southern California wants while protecting the environment – specifically fish and habitat?
This is all unsettled. We have not passed state laws to deal with these conflicting goals. The political leaders in the state, sensing it was the wrong year, punted on a multibillion dollar water bond that would have produced a peripheral canal…”
It is my understanding that the intention is to bring up the bond issue in two years, when the economy is better and the bond issue has a better chance of being approved. Make no mistake, Southern CA is determined to take water from Norther CA…
Mr. Toad: “I don’t know why you fail to understand that as long as the treated water is returned upstream of the delta we are talking about little water being lost from the Delta watershed. The real issues are water quality and cost not water rights.”
If water is diverted to Southern CA, it is not being returned to the Delta watershed.
Davis is upstream of the Delta. So Cal is outside the Sacramento River watershed. Water taken there is not returned upstream of the Delta. These are two completely different issues.
An interesting overview on the peripheral canal:
[url]http://watershed.ucdavis.edu/myths/peripheral+canal/#1[/url]
From Don Shor’s link: “A peripheral canal alone will not fix California’s environmental or water supply problems, and is unlikely to improve native fish populations enough to immediately allow increases in exports above currently restricted levels. Some reduction in water exports would likely be required with a canal, at least until fish populations recover.”
From the Union Democrat: “Local agencies dislike what they see in a report from the California Environmental Protection Agency on what is needed to improve conditions for salmon and other species in the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta.
The report, “Development of Flow Criteria for the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta Ecosystem,” suggests that more water be allowed to flow from the Stanislaus, Tuolumne, Mokelumne and other rivers into the Delta, to improve conditions for salmon, smelt, shad and other fish.
But upstream users like the Tuolumne Utilities District and Calaveras County Water District think measures called for in the non-binding report that now sits before the newly formed advisory Delta Stewardship Council threaten their water supplies.
If the measures proposed in the report are eventually adopted, reductions on local water use could be forced and “Calaveras County residents and CCWD ratepayers could potentially end up having to pay,” said Ed Pattison, CCWD’s water resources manager.
Too much of the burden of improving the Delta would rest on upstream users’ shoulders, he said.
“The beneficiaries should pay, which are largely the exporters from the Delta,” Pattison said.
The impacts of habitat restoration and predation need to be considered, not just flows, he added.
The CCWD board supports a recovery plan for the Delta that is comprehensive, Pattison said.
“It needs to be based on good science, not just on politics, which seems to be the way of water in California,” he said.”
From Sacramento Bee:
“Delta plan churns up concerns
mweiser@sacbee.com
Published Friday, Nov. 19, 2010
In a glassy conference room alongside a Sacramento River levee, a committee of 25 people struggled Thursday to do what Californians have never been able to do before: reach agreement on how to drink from the Delta without killing it.
After meeting for four years and spending $140 million, the committee drafting the Bay Delta Conservation Plan aimed Thursday to complete a “Nov. 18 draft” of its progress so far. This odd name for the document reflects the enormous stakes in crafting a plan that meets two goals: restoring the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta ecosystem and building a pair of tunnels or canal to ferry its water elsewhere.
It is not the final draft that water agencies and the Schwarzenegger administration wanted by this date, nor even the “working draft” they were prepared to settle for. It is enough of a draft, however, to keep environmental groups and Delta residents in the room.
“It is a snapshot in time on where we’ve gotten to date,” said Karen Scarborough, undersecretary of the state’s Natural Resources Agency and chair of the steering committee. “We are not at the top yet, but we are at a very broad, stable ledge.”
The multibillion-dollar plan may be teetering on the brink of that ledge, however, after developments over the last two weeks.
At a meeting last week in Washington, D.C., representatives of the Westlands Water District, a huge irrigation agency in the San Joaquin Valley, reportedly stormed out of a meeting with David Hayes, an Interior Department undersecretary. Other meeting participants told The Bee the trigger was a discussion that the plan may include reduced water deliveries.
And at a meeting in Los Banos on Wednesday, a number of federal water contractors were ready to withdraw funding to continue the conservation plan, said Brett Baker, a lobbyist for the Central Delta Water Agency who was there. The group plans to consider the motion again next week, he said.
“It’s just, in my opinion, not going very well,” Jason Peltier, a Westlands representative, told an Assembly oversight hearing on the Delta on Tuesday.
“There’s going to need to be some kind of a reset – some kind of a come to Jesus – about how all our interests can be met, or not met, and tell people they’re not going to get what they had been hoping for,” he said.
The plan’s goal is to protect freshwater exports while also restoring Delta habitat. Seven fish species in the Delta, the West’s largest estuary, have been driven to the brink of extinction by demand for its water, which serves 25 million Californians and 3 million acres of farmland. Invasive species, water pollution and habitat loss have also contributed.
The centerpiece of the conservation plan is a tunnel system or canal to divert Sacramento River water out of the estuary and deliver it directly to export canals near Tracy. In addition, more than 115,000 acres of restored habitat would help wildlife rebound.
The project is unprecedented in California and perhaps the nation. The tunnels option would cost $12.7 billion, while the canal would cost $8.4 billion.
Habitat projects would add about $4 billion more to either option.
Completion of the Nov. 18 draft marks an important milestone. But numerous political and economic obstacles loom, and the question now is whether the project is on a path to construction or veering toward a bureaucratic dustbin.
It came under attack by some committee members who objected to calling the draft “finished,” as Scarborough’s agency did in a press release on Tuesday.
That’s because, while the draft is the most complete so far, it leaves enormous holes. One is a lack of substantive analysis of how water diversions into a new canal or tunnels will affect the Delta’s aquatic environment.
Either design is large enough to divert the Sacramento River’s entire flow under some conditions, and environmentalists and Delta residents are still waiting for language that would guarantee adequate river flows to protect habitat and water quality.
“I’m not feeling well,” said Deanna Sereno, a committee member representing the Contra Costa Water District, which often finds itself allied with environmental groups because it draws drinking water directly from the Delta. “I’m really nervous about what we’re finalizing here.”
The committee plans to complete an official draft of the plan by July and an environmental impact study by October. Final approval is expected in late 2012 or early 2013. The plan would then have to be approved by state and federal wildlife agencies.
Whether all of this happens depends largely on two things: Gov.-elect Jerry Brown and economics.
Brown asserted in his campaign that he intends to see the plan through to completion of the environmental review process.
Money may be a bigger concern, and it is amplified by a growing realization that water agencies may not get as much Delta water from the project as they hoped. If deliveries are reduced, the economics make even less sense.
© Copyright The Sacramento Bee. All rights reserved.
[quote]Nevertheless, I believe local officials should be much more sanguine about long term prospects than they are. — David Greenwald[/quote]Given the context of your blog post, David, I don’t think you understand the definition of the word “sanguine”.
David Greenwald: I should mention that you didn’t talk with me or cover anything that I said during the extensive discussion on the wastewater treatment plant.
First, I concur with “local leaders” that your concerns about the water rights issue are misplaced. In all likelihood, we will obtain water rights, and they will be good for at least about 30 years.
Secondly, the Davis Enterprise did a better job of reporting on the wastewater treatment plant discussion than you have on this blog. The wastewater treatment plant is not a little issue. It is a huge issue – it is the most expensive project that the city has yet committed to, and it is crucial that it be done correctly.
If you recall, the council was on the verge of signing a contract for an overbuilt and not necessarily optimally designed water treatment that would have cost up to $100 million more than the two options currently under consideration.
For over a year, I had begged, pleaded and argued with the council to hire two world-renowned outside experts to review this overpriced design and to see if the project could be done more cost-efficiently. These pleas were met with irritation and contempt by my colleagues.
Eventually, when the council was on the verge of signing the contract for the almost $200 million dollar plant, I created enough public concern about the cumulative cost of the two projects that Don Saylor reluctantly (yes, I have kept all of the streaming video records that corroborate this) agreed to a “weekend charrette” led by the two world-renowned experts who had been recommended to me by pretty much every hydrologist in town.
These experts, in consultation with a number of other experts, concluded that we could make some innovative improvements in our existing plant for almost half the price.
Frankly, David, given the massive internet attack you launched on me for getting testy with Ruth when I was fighting the thankless battle of trying to obtain desperately needed labor contract reforms on our outrageously expensive cafeteria cash-out, one would think you would at least give me credit where credit is due in saving the city $75 to $100 million dollars on this wastewater treatment plant.
Now these same two experts have studied two options that are both about half the price of the plant that the council majority had been on the verge of approving. They recommended the locally-controlled option of upgrading our own wastewater treatment plant, rather than the priced option of building a massive pipeline to Woodland and shipping our waste there.
At the last council meeting, I insisted on questioning our experts themselves, rather than the version of their recommendations as conveyed by our staff. In the course of this questioning, it was clear that their actual recommendation for the locally controlled option was substantially stronger than the staff version of their recommendation.
Staff recommendation was to continue to talk with Woodland to see of cost and “governance” issues could be “worked out”.
But it is clear that “governance issues” could never be worked out because wastewater is much more complicated than surface water, with differing effluent qualities, changing regulations and differing future growth possibilities between the two jurisdictions. And there were just too many other advantages to the Davis option. Finally, Woodland option capital costs were already sufficiently higher and estimates sufficiently uncertain that even concessions obtained during further negotiations could not reasonably swing the project toward the Woodland option.
So I made a motion that we just proceed with option of improving the Davis plant. I lost this motion 4-1, which was very disappointing. Again, council accepted staff recommendation over the recommendation of the world-renowned experts that we finally, although belatedly, hired.
Thanks to everyone, it does appear to me also (now!) that dmg meant “less sanguine,” and i did not catch it – my apologies. ca
Sue Greenwald: “Eventually, when the council was on the verge of signing the contract for the almost $200 million dollar plant, I created enough public concern about the cumulative cost of the two projects that Don Saylor reluctantly (yes, I have kept all of the streaming video records that corroborate this) agreed to a “weekend charrette” led by the two world-renowned experts who had been recommended to me by pretty much every hydrologist in town.”
I remember this very well, and thank you for staying the course on this issue.
Sue Greenwald: “So I made a motion that we just proceed with option of improving the Davis plant. I lost this motion 4-1, which was very disappointing. Again, council accepted staff recommendation over the recommendation of the world-renowned experts that we finally, although belatedly, hired.”
And I hope you will stay the course on this issue as well.
I think my concern (and others) is with the surface water project. The basis for a less expensive wastewater treatment plant upgrade is the import of cleaner water from the Sacto River. But it sounds as if it is not clear if Davis will be able to get the surface water it needs when it needs it bc of all the controversy surrounding the Delta (wildlife preservation versus water rights versus need for peripheral canal/shipping water to Southern CA). Can you give us some insight on this issue from your perspective and what you have heard/know?
Heh. “Wildlife preservation”/habitat land is another bag of worms entirely. I’d suggest reading the Solano County Water Agency minutes on the BDCP. Habitat land is threatening to make their water intake unacceptably unhealthy and force them to re-route the North Bay Aqueduct.