Tag Archive for: Sustainable Groundwater Management Act

Opinion: Madera County’s Groundwater Situation Is Dire. New Efforts Are Underway to Address It

/in , /by /The Fresno Beeby Rob Poythress

The Sustainable Groundwater Management Act (SGMA) made the County of Madera responsible for groundwater management for the more than 200,000 acres that are not part of an irrigation or water district (the “white areas”) in Madera County. Like many regions in the Central Valley, Madera County is heavily groundwater dependent. The average annual shortage in the Madera subbasin alone is approximately 165,000 acre-feet per year, a number calculated over a 50-year period to account for both wet and dry periods.

 

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A Test for California’s Groundwater Regulations in the Megadrought

/in , , /by /Bloomberg Lawby Stephanie Osler Hastings

Record dry conditions once again in the West have led the federal and state governments to declare water supply shortages. California’s governor has declared that 50 counties, in which approximately 41% of the state’s population exists, are now under a drought state of emergency. This prompted the adoption of emergency regulations ordering water rights holders to curtail their water diversions on numerous northern California rivers.

The state and federal water projects, which together deliver water to approximately 30 million Californians and more than one-third of the state’s agricultural farmland, have reduced deliveries to 5% or less. As a result, agricultural, urban, and environmental water users are being forced to cut back with “devastating impacts on our communities, businesses and ecosystems.”

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Report: Groundwater Overhaul Could Threaten Drinking Water Of More Than A Million Valley Residents

/in , /by /KVPRby Kerry Klein

As drought settles over the San Joaquin Valley, a new report warns of other circumstances that could result in entire communities losing drinking water. More than a million Valley residents could lose their public water in coming decades under the sweeping groundwater legislation known as the Sustainable Groundwater Management Act (SGMA), according to the paper published earlier this month by the non-profit Pacific Institute. Signed into law in 2014, SGMA aims over the next two decades to reduce California’s groundwater deficit by balancing water pumped out of the ground with the amount replenished.

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How ‘Sustainable’ is California’s Groundwater Sustainability Act?

/in , /by /High Country Newsby Nick Bowlin

Beneath the almond and citrus fields of the San Joaquin Valley lies an enormous system of aquifers that feeds some of the world’s most productive farmland. Hundreds of miles north and east, along the Nevada border, is the Surprise Valley, a remote, high-desert region undergirded by cone-shaped hollows of sediment that hold deposits of water. Both of these water systems, along with every other groundwater basin in California — a whopping 515 entities — must create individually tailored plans to manage their water use more sustainably. In scale and ambition, California’s Sustainable Groundwater Management Act (SGMA) has few parallels. And the work becomes increasingly urgent as the climate crisis makes water shortages increasingly severe.

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LAFCO Remains Neutral on RCD Participation in GSA

/in , /by /Fallbrook Village Newsby Joe Naiman

Under Local Agency Formation Commission law, the county LAFCO agency must grant latent powers to a special district if such latent powers are not already authorized by state law. Under a law called the Sustainable Groundwater Management Act local agencies were required to form a Groundwater Sustainability Agency for high-priority and medium-priority basins by July 2017 and have a January 2022 deadline to develop plans to achieve long-term groundwater sustainability.

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Opinion: California Needs Comprehensive Groundwater Management

/in , /by /CalMattersby Jeanette Howard, Melissa M. Rohde and Barton H. Thompson

While California’s landmark Sustainable Groundwater Management Act promised comprehensive protection of the state’s groundwater, significant gaps remain in its coverage. The Department of Water Resources now has an opportunity to reduce or eliminate those gaps and should seize the moment. We know all Californians will experience another year of water shortages and warmer, drier conditions that will require conservation and which are likely to fuel destructive wildfires in our forests and around our communities.

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LAFCO Approves Municipal Service Review, Sphere Updates for RCDs

/in , /by /Village Newsby Joe Naiman

San Diego County’s Local Agency Formation Commission approved municipal service reviews for the county’s three resource conservation districts while also updating the sphere of influence for each RCD. Separate 8-0 LAFCO board votes Monday, Feb. 1, approved the municipal service reviews for the Resource Conservation District of Greater San Diego, the Mission Resource Conservation District and the Upper San Luis Rey Resource Conservation District while approving a sphere of influence update for each RCD which does not alter the sphere boundaries. LAFCO also had a presentation and discussion on the Sustainable Groundwater Management Act that morning, although no board action was taken.

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Water Authority and GSA To Settle On Sagging Friant-Kern Canal Resolution

/in , /by /The Sun Gazetteby John Lindt

The Friant Water Authority cleaned up some of the most important work in the last month of the year hashing out a legal settlement with farmers in southern Tulare County.

Represented by the Eastern Tule Groundwater Sustainability Agency farmers agreed to contribute at least $125 million to repair the significant subsidence-caused sag in the gravity-fed canal that has cut water deliveries by 60%.

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Opinion: We Can Find Common Ground to Solve Challenging Water Issues

/in , , /by /CalMattersby Cannon Michael and Ann Hayden

Despite a seemingly endless era of upheaval – a surging pandemic, contentious election cycle and racial strife – we still have the responsibility to address pressing issues that cannot wait for calmer times. The future of California’s water is one of those issues. While collaboration and relationship building have been made even more challenging due to distancing required by COVID-19, we believe that water is an issue where we can rise above party lines and entrenched perspectives.

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Opinion: Here’s the Challenge of Implementing Historic Groundwater Law

/in , , /by /CalMattersby Burnell Blanchard

California celebrated the passage of historic legislation six years ago when Gov. Jerry Brown signed into law the Sustainable Groundwater Management Act, written to achieve sustainable groundwater management for basins throughout the state.

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