Thursday July 23, 2026
The Metropolitan Water District of Southern California —
To address ongoing risks to water supply operations and reinforce its commitment to sustainable land management, Metropolitan’s Board of Directors approved last week construction and restoration of approximately 2,800 acres of wetlands and upland habitat on district-owned land in the Delta.
The wetland restoration is part of a larger project to transform Webb Tract, a Metropolitan-owned island in the Delta, from conventional agriculture to a multi-beneficial landscape designed to reverse subsidence and reduce flood risk, capture planet-warming carbon dioxide, and enhance the local ecosystem for migratory birds and local species.
“While members of our board carefully weighed further investments in the Webb Tract project during our deliberations, there is strong consensus that stabilizing the ecosystem in the Delta is paramount to also stabilizing our deliveries of water from Northern California,” said Metropolitan Board Chair Adán Ortega, Jr. “The Delta is not the source of our water supplies, but it is the source of our common challenges. The investment in Webb Tract reflects our hope to see longer-term benefits.”
The Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta is a critical link in the State Water Project and supports millions of people statewide, a struggling ecosystem, agriculture and local communities, while remaining one of the state’s most ecologically altered and vulnerable regions for the last century.