Every governor of California since the Gipper has sworn that he will "fix" the Delta. And every one has failed. Water rights decisions designed to protect the estuary and fill aqueducts have been serially litigated, ignored and suppressed. Until recently. California is still failing to fix the Delta, but it's failing better. KCET explains.
Who has the rights to California's water, in what order, for what, in what quantity, and under what terms, is by no means simple. However, KCET's Bay Delta Project explains it.
KCET's new Bay Delta Project, funded by the Rose Foundation, explains how water from the Sacramento and San Joaquin rivers ended up in the faucets of 25 million Californians and fields of the San Joaquin Valley.
To tunnel beneath the Sacramento-San Joaquin Bay Delta or not? Without relief for the South Delta pumps currently serving California's Central Valley farms and the exurbias of San Diego and Los Angeles, the National Marine Fisheries Service sees doom for the Delta's once mighty populations of migrating salmon and steelhead as well as year-round residents such as Delta Smelt.
