President Donald Trump is being credited for the passage of a new provision through the U.S. House of Representatives on Thursday that will provide funding to help California to build its first water storage infrastructure in 40 years.
Rep. Tom McClintock (R-CA) is leading an effort to end environmentalists’ ability to delay the building of dams and reservoirs on federal land by fast-tracking control of the permitting process, placing power in the hands of the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation.
California’s infrastructure crisis keeps making front page news — this time with the failure of equipment at a key pumping station in the State Water Project, which supplies drinking water to about half the state’s population.
Proponents of a ballot measure that would prioritize water storage projects over the construction of a high-speed train have begun collecting the signatures necessary to place the measure on California’s 2016 ballot.
A majority of California voters support an upcoming ballot measure that would strip funding from the high speed rail project and divert it toward new water storage projects, according to a poll released Thursday.
California will suffer severe shortages, with or without a warmer planet. We need to act soon. Water policy may not generate flashy headlines, and politicians who lay the foundations for reform may not be in office ten or twenty years from now, when credit is handed out. But it can be done. Israel has shown us how.
“Dam [thumbs up]… Train [thumbs down]… Governor, put our water before your train,” reads a billboard message erected by Fresno City Councilman Steve Brandau, revealed this week in California’s Central Valley.
