SoCal water provider slow to praise governor's plan

By: GIG CONAUGHTON - Staff Writer | Friday, September 21, 2007 12:20 AM PDT ∞

LOS ANGELES ----Southern California's main water supplier said Thursday that Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's $9 billion plan to fix California's threatened water supplies says nothing specific about the state's biggest problem ---- how to deliver water through the ecologically fragile Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta.

Water agencies, farmers and business groups around the state immediately praised Schwarzenegger's proposal to spend billions on new dams and reservoirs when he released it Tuesday, calling the plan "far reaching" and "comprehensive."

But officials from the Los Angeles-based Metropolitan Water District said the state needed to adopt criteria like Metropolitan board members approved Sept. 11. Those guidelines ---- which Metropolitan hopes to lobby state legislators to support ---- assert that the state needs to build some sort of canal around, or through, the delta to separate endangered fish and environmental problems from Southern California's now-threatened water supplies.

Metropolitan supplies water to nearly 18 million Southern Californians in six counties, including San Diego and Riverside.

The delta has been at the center of problems that threaten state water supplies.

Water leaders around the state are still reeling from an Aug. 31 federal court decision that would limit pumping in the delta in 2008 in order to protect an endangered fish that is being killed in the pumps.

Schwarzenegger convened a special legislative session ---- now meeting ---- after water officials statewide said the court-ordered pumping cutbacks could produce water shortages around California next year. Metropolitan officials say it could mean a 30 percent cut to Southern Californian's water from the north, which accounted for two-thirds of the regions' supply this year.

The delta is the heart of the massive State Water Project. The project is a 600-mile system of dams, reservoirs, pumps and aqueducts that deliver rain fall and snowmelt from Northern California to the rest of the state.

Details in the governor's plan still need to be worked out, but it would set aside half the $9 billion to build dams and create more surface storage that could be used as backup supplies. Under the plan, the state would spend another $1 billion for water recycling, conservation and other supply-reliability projects, and $1.9 billion on general plans to restore the delta.

Schwarzenegger's proposal is competing with a separate, $5.4 billion legislative plan forwarded by state Senate President Pro Tem Don Perata, D-Oakland. Both packages would require voter approval, perhaps as early as February.

Schwarzenegger's plan does not put any money aside to help build the type of canal ---- either around or inside the delta ---- that Metropolitan and others say is critical to answering the long-term questions about whether water would be able to be pumped from Northern California.

Metropolitan General Manager Jeff Kightlinger said that does not bother Metropolitan, which assumes that water agencies and their ratepayers would pony up the billions needed to build such a canal.

But he said the plan also does not include any specific direction on the delivery issue.

The plan simply states that there is "an emerging consensus that a new conveyance system, separate and distinct from the delta, is needed" ---- and it offers arguments to support a new conveyance system.

By contrast, the Perata bill includes intent to build delta "conveyance" improvements that would meet specific criteria, including: to reduce impacts to fish from pumps, improve fish and wildlife habitat and improve water supply conveyance.

Kightlinger said that was more like the guidelines Metropolitan adopted that could build a canal.

"We want to see legislation that would adopt the same kind of criteria that our board did," Metropolitan Water District General Manager Jeff Kightlinger said. "Our view has always been we want this to be a balanced, comprehensive package. And we want conveyance addressed."

Contact staff writer Gig Conaughton at (760) 739-6696 or gconaughton@nctimes.com.