Dealing with one of the worst droughts on record and then the largest, most destructive wildfires in California’s history, the Secretary of California’s Natural Resources Agency has his hands full. The Natural Resource Agency is a sprawling, cabinet-level state agency overseeing and coordinating 25 different departments, from Cal Fire to the Department of Water Resources with a lot to coordinate over the last several years.
Yet Secretary John Laird, former City of Santa Cruz council member, two-term mayor, and three-term state assembly member found time to participate in the annual “Secchi Dip-In” at the Loch Lomond Recreation Area on July 28. Secretary Laird also helped christen a new, 22-passenger pontoon boat, “The Newell Jewel,” to be used on the lake for nature tours and carrying cargo for infrastructure improvements planned for the dam.
After mentioning his concern about the wild fires raging around Redding last weekend, Laird spoke briefly to the Press Banner about critical issues facing the state. Responding to a question about the federal roll-back of many environmental regulations, Laird said he was concerned the state did not have the staff or the resources to “back-fill” the federal support the state has come to rely on for enforcement of environmental regulations.
“In the past, we have coordinated very well. My apprehension is we’re not staffed to do everything, and if the Feds walk away from some protections, and the state protections become supreme, we need to have the money and get staffed up to enforce state law,” Laird said.
Sharing the state’s water supply between northern California, the Central Valley and southern California seems to be a perennial issue in California- an issue that Laird actually studied as an undergraduate politics major at UCSC. This same issue has been the target of recent and sharp criticism from Republican Rep. Jeff Denham of Turlock over the most recent water allocation plan. This has included a visit by U.S. Secretary of the Interior Ryan Zinke to Turlock on the Denham’s invitation to help protest the proposed water allocation.
“We do water distribution and delivery jointly with the Feds and I’ve met with Secretary Ryan Zinke three times – and these issues are front and center. The key issues for the State Water Board, as well as Department Fish and Wildlife, are increasing the flows into the Delta to sustain that ecosystem and protect endangered species. Meanwhile, we’ve been trying to reach voluntary agreements with various water districts on the allocation plan, and we’ll just have to see if these negotiations will bear fruit,” Laird said.
Now considered something of a legacy infrastructure project of Governor Jerry Brown’s administration, the Delta tunnels project, referred to as the California WaterFix, is, at $17.1 billion, one of the biggest and most expensive renovations to the California Water Project in a generation. The project involves two massive tunnels through the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta that will fundamentally change the way water is diverted through the delta to distribution points for the Central Valley and southern California. This project has been in planning and financing stages for most of Laird’s seven and half year term as Secretary of the Natural Resources Agency, and is finally “good to go”, according to Laird, “except perhaps for some law suits,” he added.
The project has drawn fierce opposition from environmental groups, arguing the state needs to simply reduce its draw of water from the Delta, and yet has also been received with a good deal of skepticism by central valley farmers and water districts in southern California.
State Department of Water Resources (DWR) officials wrote in a permit application that, “It takes the sophisticated use of water to make California the most populous state in the nation, with the most productive farm economy and a rich abundance of wildlife and natural beauty. DWR pursues the California WaterFix to better protect native fish species in the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta and to safeguard water supplies for future generations,” as reported in the Sacramento Bee.
A rider in federal budget legislation for the U.S. Department of the Interior, inserted by Republican Rep. Ken Calvert, Riverside County, included a provision prohibiting state or federal lawsuits against the California WaterFix project. Oddly enough, although Governor Brown and the State Natural Resources Agency has tirelessly advocated for the project, they reject a federal mandate against environmental-related law suits against it- as a matter of principal.
“It’s just not right to exempt a project from due process. We’ve been working for seven and half years with the stakeholders to make it legal so it can withstand a legal test and there should not be immunity to a legal challenge,” Laird said.
Unlike most counties in the Central Valley and southern California, Santa Cruz County does not import any of its water, and relies on the storage capacity of Loch Lomond to protect itself from drought. Back at Loch Lomond, the water clarity measured by a simple yet effective instrument in the Secchi Dip-in was somewhat obscured by a recent algae bloom. But the wildlife around the reservoir, including a fly-by of a bald eagle, seems to thriving.
Talking to a group of visitors at the Loch Lomond, after recognizing the ongoing tragedies of the Carr fire around Redding, Laird summed up by saying he didn’t want to sound too negative, but of the many natural resource issues he deals with, “If it’s going really well, it unfortunately never gets to my desk,” Laird said.
