Monday November 10, 2025
Visalia Times Delta —
Many people in the San Joaquin Valley have seen the ominous photo: It depicts a person standing next to a telephone pole that bears a series of signs labeled with years.
Way at the top of the pole is a sign that reads “1962.” Several feet lower is a sign reading, “1970.” Much further down, another sign says, “2015,” followed by more signs for the years 2019, 2021 and finally a sign at the bottom that reads “2025.”
Another label explains that each sign on the pole shows the levels that year of the ground, which has sunk from the depletion of groundwater in a phenomenon called “subsidence.”
The labels for each year are notches on the pole that show how severely subsidence has occurred. Seen another way, it depicts how much water is being pumped from the ground without being replenished.
And that is why the photo is so ominous, because the signs don’t stop there, just as the pumping doesn’t stop there. The image is a graphic depiction of an existential threat to the San Joaquin Valley – the loss of groundwater as represented by another physical threat – subsidence.
Water users, property owners, municipalities and other stakeholders in the Valley, are struggling to find solutions to those critical problems. They are under a state mandate to do so, and the stakes are nothing less than survival: If those signs keep sinking down that telephone pole, the Valley will literally dry up and blow away.
“Groundwater and Land Subsidence – A Pending Crisis” will be a public forum presented by Tulare County Voices at 210, at 7 p.m. on Tuesday, Nov. 11 at 210 W. Center Ave.
“Tulare County Voices at 210” is a monthly forum that explores topics of local interest and is co-sponsored by the Visalia Times-Delta, the Valley Voice, and First Presbyterian Church.
This month’s forum is intended to explain what is being done to address the twin issues of groundwater depletion and subsidence. Clearly if those twin issues are not addressed, the Valley faces a dire future, maybe no future at all.
Water is vital to all life certainly. In the Valley, where agriculture provides a livelihood indirectly or directly to everyone, it’s even more crucial, if that’s possible.