Climate crisis and systemic inequities drive push to reform California water laws
LA TimesCalifornia’s mountain snowpack is shrinking, and climate change is intensifying the severe drought. “Climate change makes the situation that much more acute.” The group recommended changing state law so that decisions about water rights, including approvals of new diversions from streams and rivers, would require regulators to consider the effects of climate change. He said there have been warnings for years that people will suffer from climate change in the future, but Californians are already seeing the water rights system “fail for disadvantaged communities, the environment, farms and our cities.” Under the current system, the State Water Resources Control Board considers historical stream flow data in decisions about water rights permits, but that “is no longer defensible” as climate change leaves less flowing in watersheds, said Clifford Lee, a former state deputy attorney general who was one of the report’s authors. Lee said it’s astounding that California, the land of high technology and home of Silicon Valley, “lacks the ability on a real-time basis to determine who is diverting water from surface water sources, when such diversions are occurring, in what amounts.” Under existing law, the state requires only that diverters report how much they used in the previous year. Lee said this change would align California with other western states and make for a “more unified water rights system.” Other members of the group included law professors from UC Davis and Stanford University, as well as former state water board member Tam Doduc.
History of this topic
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