Recently, 18 south-of-the-Delta and Southern California senators and assembly members wrote a letter to Interior Secretary Ken Salazar, Resources Secretary John Laird, and Bureau of Reclamation Commissioner Mike Connor complaining about delays in the Bay Delta Conservation Plan (BDCP) process. They said the process has been open and transparent (not true); that the threat of...Read More

The Hanford Sentinel reports that Kings County agriculture had a record-setting year in 2011. The annual crop report showed an agricultural output of $2.2 billion, considerably higher than the previous record of $1.76 billion set in 2007, before the recent drought. One crop that saw a major rebound was cotton, which jumped from $244 million...Read More

This week, the Public Policy Institute of California (PPIC) had a meeting to introduce its new publication, “Water and the California Economy.” This publication was funded (as the PPIC’s other water-related think-tank efforts have been) by the S. D. Bechtel, Jr. Foundation, which has an ongoing interest in the kinds of analysis that make Delta...Read More

Also this week, the Delta Vision Foundation presented its 2012 Report Card assessing progress on implementation of the Delta Vision Strategic Plan, assigning letter grades in seven categories which it analyzes. Only in “Governance” was  a B grade assigned, and that decreased to B- from the previous year’s B+. Four of the categories received lower...Read More

SB 250, Senator Mark Rubio’s bill calling for the completion of the BDCP process by 2013, and construction of the canal by 2025, has been moved up for hearing in the Assembly Water, Parks and Wildlife Committee to June 12, 2012.  Please send a letter today to Committee Chair, Jared Huffman, explaining why rushing this...Read More