Posted August 19, 2014
On August
13, California lawmakers agreed on a $7.5 billion water plan, which includes
$2.7 billion for water storage, according to a Wall Street Journal article
available here.
Capital Press also published an article available here
and Bloomberg here.
The plan
would be the largest investment in decades, and it is designed to “build
reservoirs, clean up contaminated groundwater, and promote water-saving
technologies.”
The ballot measure passed through both houses of the
Legislature: 77-2 in the Assembly and 37-0 in the Senate.
California Governor Jerry Brown signed the legislation,
which was 25 percent higher than he stated the state could afford, into law,
according to Bloomberg.
“Water is the lifeblood of any civilization and for
California it’s the precondition of healthy rivers, valleys, farms and a strong
economy,” Brown said.
Groups such as the California Farm Bureau Federation
believed that the new bond measure negotiated this year would maintain the $3
billion for dams and reservoirs, which was originally in the $11.1 billion bond
passed by the Legislature in 2009, according to Capital
Press.
However, the measure began being scaled back to make it more
“palatable” to voters, and most agriculture advocates now believe this was the
best outcome after a $2 billion budget was introduced for water storage.
“The $2 billion just wasn’t going to cut it,” California
Citrus Mutual president Joel Nelsen said. “Even if it passed, we had nothing.
Certain farm groups went for $2.5 billion, but it didn’t guarantee either
specific storage facility to be built and there was no cross-valley connector,
so there was no way to move the water from Point A to Point B. I told the
governor that for the rest of us, it wasn’t good enough.”
The plan also includes other provisions, such as $900
million to replenish and clean up groundwater, $810 million for drought
preparedness, $725 million for water recycling, and $520 million to cleanse
some small communities’ drinking water supply.
For more information on environmental law, please visit the
National Agricultural Law Center’s website here.
