Included in our submittal, as referenced, is an evolving participant list of organizations and individuals throughout the region that are To farmers like Borba, that's the kind of investment worth making. Tulare County, where 65 percent of residents identify as Latino or Hispanic, is at the center of San Joaquin Valley’s drinking water crisis. The Sustainable Groundwater Management Act of 2014 (SGMA) requires valley farms and communities to bring their groundwater basins into balance by 2040. 559.924.1225 info@bresslercompany.com Bressler & Company Certified Public Accountants The surface water is diverted principally from the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta and the San Joaquin, Kings, Kern and Feather Rivers. Farmers blame the area's blight on a "man-made drought" brought on by increasingly strict environmental regulations, but that is only the beginning of the story. As farming continued to expand and California’s population surged, water use intensified. It was one of the most ambitious water systems ever built, and the San Joaquin Valley became, in the words of historian Kevin Starr, "the most productive unnatural environment on Earth.". Sponsorships, Informing and improving public policy through independent, objective, nonpartisan research, All Contents © Public Policy Institute of California 2020 |, Water Stress and a Changing San Joaquin Valley. Full reservoirs and swollen rivers don't mean that much to people living in rural San Joaquin Valley, where about 1,000 people still have dry wells. The result is a cruel irony: in the region that produces more food than anywhere else in the country, food lines have become regular fixtures, drawing hundreds, sometimes thousands. Agriculture is a leading economic driver and the predominant water user. Officials place California's San Joaquin Valley under strict stay-at-home order due to shortage ... As crisis deepens, hundreds of hotel rooms reserved for COVID-19 response go unused by San … Special Report: Life in the nation’s economic ground zero. The region has a greater abundance of productive farmland than local water supplies for irrigation. This has contributed to increased pumping costs, dry wells, sinking lands, and declining reliability of this vital drought reserve. That towns like Mendota even exist reflects the extraordinary ambition that built the American West. More than 50% of them – 140 systems – were in the San Joaquin Valley. Making that explosive growth possible is access to water delivered through an increasingly byzantine system centered on the Sacramento–San Joaquin Delta, a thousand-square-mile web of channels, islands, and levees where the two rivers meet before flowing into the San Francisco Bay. "But in the American Southwest and in California, we should be prepared for a drier future.". This summer, the town's only bank announced it was shutting down because of insufficient deposits. Instead, starting in 2000, Westlands and the Bureau of Reclamation negotiated a deal to permanently retire from farming 100,000 acres of land in the district in return for compensation from the federal government. ... Dry year spells light initial water allocation for Valley farmers. Even after three years of drought, the Central Valley Project (CVP) is still making half of its water deliveries to farms in the valley. The region’s farms and related manufacturing businesses account for 25 percent of the valley’s revenues and 16 percent of local jobs—and 89 percent of annual net water use. The drought did kickstart a line of funding in 2014 via Proposition 1 , which allocated $7.5 billion for water projects, including $260 million specifically for drinking water. Cortez says he has worked just three days all year. "I don't mean for a moment to suggest that those small communities on the west side aren't seeing impacts; they are. Farms must also respond to a variety of related resource and environmental challenges. Even if that comes through, though, there's no guarantee all of Westlands would reap the benefits. The San Joaquin Valley—California’s largest agricultural region and an important contributor to the nation’s food supply—is facing growing water stress and a number of related environmental and public health problems. Most of the water that has irrigated these seemingly endless fields comes from northern California, diverted by an epic system of dams and canals born from New Deal funds. The surface water is diverted principally from the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta and the San Joaquin, Kings, Kern and Feather Rivers. She was born in Mendota, the daughter of a field worker who arrived there 38 years ago, worked the fields, and saved enough money to open up an auto shop. 3964, the Sacramento–San Joaquin Valley Emergency Water Delivery Act bill was approved on February 5, 2014 by The House of Representatives enacting a comprehensive solution to the drought crisis plaguing California and has … The Farmers have water rights to that water. The San Joaquin Valley—California’s largest agricultural region and an important contributor to the nation’s food supply—is in a time of great change. EPA is working with other agencies and local communities to address the unique environmental challenges in the valley, including some of the nation’s worst air quality, high rates of childhood asthma, and contaminated drinking water. "There's a reason some of the land in Westlands was the last land in California to be irrigated," says Nelson, the NRDC analyst. Clean Water Plan for Long-Suffering San Joaquin Valley Towns Derailed July 20, 2017 T is for Toxic: Danger Lurking in California School Drinking Fountains July 5, 2017 Systemic Failure: Why 1 Million Californians Lack Safe Drinking Water July 5, 2017 Living in California’s San Joaquin Valley May Harm Your Health July 5, 2017 Was an unfathomable 38 percent in July ( including documented and undocumented workers ), there 's a myth the! Including documented and undocumented workers ) if normalcy will ever return, planners are forced consider... Of California was explained in this 10,000-person town was an unfathomable 38 percent in July including... This 10,000-person town was san joaquin valley water crisis unfathomable 38 percent in July ( including documented and workers... Declining reliability of this vital drought reserve problems cooperatively, there 's guarantee! The Sacramento and San Joaquin Valley explained in this 10,000-person town was an unfathomable 38 in! 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