Wednesday July 2, 2025
The Packer —
California growers get the first news about how much water they will get for their operations that year in late February. In bad years, the news can start and end there. In over half of the past 24 years, however, allocation updates — usually slight increases, but not always — trickle in each month through the end of June.
June came and went this year without an update to the 55% water allocation for Central Valley Project (CVP) South-of-Delta agricultural contractors received in late May.
Of course, finding out you’re only getting half of your annual water allocation in May or June doesn’t work well for growers who have already planted crops. Knowing earlier rather than later is necessary to make fruitful plans.
According to the Westlands Water District, which serves a southern portion of the San Joaquin Valley, an estimated 210,000 acres will be followed in the district this year. That represents slightly more than a third of the district’s area.
Full Reservoirs, Low Allocations
At the end of May, when the allocation for South-of-Delta agricultural contractors went up from 50% to 55%, Allison Febbo, general manager for the Westlands Water District, called the increase appreciated but disappointing given the situation.
The situation? Almost all of California’s reservoirs were at or above their historic average levels at the time. This situation continued to the end of June.
“If you look at the reservoir levels and you look at the stream flows and you look at the general hydrology — precipitation, snowpack, all of those things — we’re in a pretty good year,” she says. “We were really hoping, in a year like this, we’d be able to get much higher allocation, much closer to our full allocation amount.”
Westlands gets its water from the San Luis Unit, a joint effort of the federal CVP and the California State Water Project. It primarily supplies irrigation water to the farmland of central California’s San Joaquin Valley; some of the most productive farmland in the world.
“When the CVP came online and we built the San Luis unit of the CVP, the expectation was we would get 100% of our water supply in all years except maybe the very driest years, so extreme drought years,” Febbo says. “And that was happening for the first decade or so, but then we started seeing environmental restrictions come in and cut our water supply.”
According to the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation, the South-of-Delta agricultural contractors have received full allocation, or come close, in only seven out of the past 35 years. In five of those past 35 years, the allocations have been nothing (0%), or close to it.
“We have a long decline in our available water supply to a point now where, instead of expecting something like 100%, we’re expecting on average maybe 30 to 40%,” Febbo says. “That’s really just unsustainable. It points to the fact that we have a broken water system in California that is not meeting the needs and intentions it was built for.”
Modernizing California’s Water Infrastructure
Febbo says the state needs modernized water infrastructure.
The two major water projects in California — the State Water Project and the CVP — were both conceived of in the early 1900s, built throughout the 1900s and represented huge investments from both the federal government and the state of California.
“The state and the federal government saw the value of building a water system in California to grow our economy to become what we are now: The fourth largest economy in the world. But unfortunately, in about the ’70s and ’80s, we as a culture stopped investing in our water systems. We haven’t made any major infrastructure improvements since,” Febbo says.
Modern water infrastructure looks like substantial investments in surface water storage and water conveyance, because it all comes down to surface water, according to Febbo.
“When we don’t have the water supply deliveries that we expect from the water projects, people turn to groundwater, and that’s caused overdraft and subsidence,” she adds. “The best way to protect our groundwater is to make sure we continue to have surface water.”
For 2025, the Westlands Water District estimates it will need to pump 200,000 acre-feet of groundwater to make up for grower needs. But the availability of groundwater will severely decline soon too.
According to California’s Sustainable Groundwater Management Act of 2014, local agencies must submit groundwater sustainability plans.
“We have an approved groundwater sustainability plan and we are meeting sustainability on a fast track by 2030, but that means we’re cutting our access to groundwater for our growers significantly — by more than half — in just a few years,” Febbo says.
This is part of why science- and data-based regulations and management systems for water are another big part of modernized water infrastructure, she adds.
“We’re looking at the various regulations on how we can move water through the Central Valley Project to make sure that, whenever we are cutting water supplies, it has a meaningful benefit. And if there is not a meaningful benefit to our ecosystems, then that action shouldn’t be taken,” she says.
“Westlands remains committed to working with state and federal partners to advance balanced, science-based solutions that improve the regulatory landscape, water storage and delivery capabilities for the hardworking families who grow the food that feeds California — and the nation — day in and day out.”
Those communities in California’s central valley are not doing well, she adds.
“We have local communities that completely rely on our agricultural operations, and we’re seeing them dwindle,” Febbo says. “Schools are closing. Businesses are closing. It’s really hard when people leave to get them back. We want to keep our communities thriving. We want to keep being able to have safe, affordable food. So, that’s why we are taking this so seriously and really advocating for our water supply.”