With the state projecting a $31 billion budget surplus, lawmakers are calling for certain allocations to go toward overdue water storage projects already approved by California voters.
The Sites Reservoir water storage plan needs to be expedited in Colusa County, Sen. Jim Nielsen, R-Tehama, vice chair of the Senate Budget Committee, told the Northern California Record.
“Seven years ago, voters passed Proposition 1 to authorize funding for that project; seven years later, not one spade, has been turned – nothing,” Nielsen said.
Even as the state endures drought, bureaucracy and endless regulatory hurdles have swallowed the project, Nielsen said.
“It’s not been made a priority of the administration, and that's our biggest challenge,” Nielsen said. “There are other organizations, albeit environmental, who push back and try to delay; there are also bureaucracies who want to hold on to their power of regulation and study, study forever,” Nielsen said.
A letter from the California Senate Republican Caucus recommends allocating $2.6 billion of the state’s $31 billion surplus to help get shovels in the ground. Infrastructure is one of the things the surplus can be used for.
Nielsen noted the reality is large surface water storage hasn’t been built after the New Melones Dam was finished in 1980s. Meanwhile, California has seen several consistent years of drought.
Nielsen said the administration's inaction ignores the human water right.
“How precarious is our situation in California?” Nielsen said. “Don’t just blame it on climate change, [state] policy has absolutely contributed to the neglect and the mess that we’re in. Don’t just put it off on global warming, which is what most tried to do; this is neglect of our management of our water resources.”
The surplus needs to address this critically needed water storage infrastructure, Nielsen said.
“And not spending any extra money on brand new programs that will obligate future budgets and keep us in fiscal peril.”