35% and counting...

Today, the expected allocation of imported water to southern California, from northern California sources, via the California Aqueduct, is set at 35%. A fact that's not changed since early February of this year. Due to last year's Delta Smelt ruling, pumping from the Delta is currently restricted, which in turn, is degrading Delta water quality.


During a joint Committee hearing held March 11, in Sacramento, an official from the Metropolitan Water District read a prepared statement into the record. The following is an excerpt from that statement:

"Despite a healthy snow pack and a series of wet storms, deliveries from the State Water Project in 2008 are dramatically curtailed. Deliveries could be impacted further due to the potential listing of another fish species, the Long Fin Smelt. Listing of additional species is also possible. Metropolitan is rapidly depleting its existing water supply reserves with no relief in sight. This depletion of reserves is occurring despite significant long-term water use efficiency investments (conservation, recycling and groundwater treatment) that have been made over the past two decades. Last month, Metropolitan’s Board of Directors approved a method of allocating water when our reserves are no longer available to avoid region-wide shortages. We have already reduced deliveries to our agricultural customers by 30 percent. In San Diego County, avocado farmers are severely pruning their trees, a technique known as stunting, as a method of keeping them alive on minimal amounts of water in hopes that the orchards could be productive again in the future."


"Once again, we call on the Metropolitan Water District and the Southern California water supply community to join Long Beach and take a more aggressive, long-term, public stance on the need to immediately conserve water," stated Bill Townsend, President of the Long Beach Board of Water Commissioners. "Implementation of strict prohibitions on certain outdoor water uses, bolstered with aggressive public communications, is the future for southern California. We're asking our colleagues to embrace this future, today. We, collectively, need to engineer a permanent lifestyle change in the way we all see and use our water, so that inefficient and wasteful uses are no longer tolerated by anyone. The only way this kind of effort is going to be sustained, is if we have all of Southern California on board."