Wednesday August 31, 2022
NRDC —
Even the most casual observer of western water recognizes that a long-delayed reckoning is coming on the Colorado River, with significant water cuts looming for those who divert water from the River. The same crisis is unfolding in a less visible way in California’s Bay-Delta estuary, the main hub for the state’s vast water supply system and the largest estuary on the west coast of the Americas.
Like the Colorado River, water diversions in California are built on a foundation of consistently extracting more water than Nature provides. California’s appropriative water rights system (“first in time, first in right”) currently determines the winners and losers as our water supply shrinks in the face of climate change.
Without reform, California’s system means that the most senior water rights holders—those who declared the water theirs during the violent and exclusionary settling of California in the late 1800s, early 1900s, predominantly irrigation districts—get first claim to the available water, while water for people to drink and bathe and water for the environment only get the leftovers.
But it doesn’t have to be this way. This century-old system of water rights does not reflect current values, and it should not dictate how the state prioritizes our limited water supplies. FM3 recently polled Californians to obtain their views on a variety of matters, including our water rights system. They found that nearly three in five respondents support reforming water rights to prioritize human health and safety and the environment over agriculture.