interviews
Water and the American West
by Richard Frank
October 25, 2021
This interview with Richard Frank, professor of environmental practice at the UC Davis School of Law and Director of the California Environmental Law and Policy Center, was conducted and condensed by franknews.
frank | Can you tell me a little bit about the story of water and how it's tied to the West, and to California in particular?
Richard | A friend of mine who's a Court of Appeals Justice here in California wrote an opinion on a water law dispute and started it with the quote, "the history of California is written on its waters." And I think that the point is true of the entire American West.
Water policy and legal issues are inextricably tied to the development of the Western United States; water is the limiting factor in so many ways to settlement, to economic development, to prosperity, and to the environment and environmental preservation.
Can you talk about the difference between groundwater and surface water– and the policies that regulate each?
There are really two types of water when it comes to human consumption. There's surface water: that is the water that is transmitted by lakes, rivers, and streams. Then there is groundwater, and a substantial amount of water that Americans and the American West rely on is groundwater. That is water that is stored in groundwater aquifers, which are naturally occurring groundwater basins. Both groundwater and surface water are critical to the American West and its economy and its culture.
Traditionally a couple of things are important to note, first of all, water is finite. Second, water gets allocated in the Western United States generally at the state level. There's a limited federal role. Primarily, policy decisions about who gets how much water for what purpose are made state by state.
I think allocation is really interesting in that it's more state-level than federal. How was water and the allocation of water in California designed? Is it a public-private combination? What goes on in terms of the infrastructure of water?
Another very good question. The answer is it depends. Most of our water infrastructure is public in nature.
Again, in the American West, the regulation of water rights is generally done at the state level, but the federal government, historically, has a major water footprint in the American West because it has been federal dollars and federal design and management that really controlled much of the major water infrastructure in the American West — you know, Hoover Dam, and the complex system of dams and reservoirs on the Colorado River in California, with the Central Valley Project that was built and managed by the federal government with Shasta Dam on the upper Sacramento River as the centerpiece of that project. But we also have a California State Water Project, the key facility being the Oroville Dam and reservoir on the Southern River that is managed by state water managers. If we were starting over, that kind of parallel system would make no particular engineering or operational sense.
But, we are captive to our history.
And then you have these massive systems of aqueducts and canals that move water from one place to another throughout the American West. They are particularly responsible for moving water from surface water storage facilities to population centers. In the last 50 to 75 years, these population centers have really expanded dramatically, so you need massive infrastructure to deliver water from those storage facilities, the dams, and reservoirs, which generally are located in remote areas to the population centers. So it takes a lot of time and energy to transport the water, from where it is captured and stored to where it is needed for human use.
California has faced continuous drought – what measures is the state taking now to manage water?
Just to frame the issue a little bit — we have, as I mentioned, a growing population in the American Southwest at a time when the amount of available water is shrinking due to drought and due to the impacts of climate change. We have growing human demand for residential and commercial purposes and at the same time, we have a shrinking water supply. That is a huge looming crisis.
And it is beginning to play out in real-time. You see that playing out in real-time. For example, several different states and Mexico rely on Colorado River flows based on an allocation system that was created in the 1920s, which is overly optimistic about the amount of available water. From the 1920s until now, that water supply has decreased, and decreased, and decreased. Now you have interstate agreements, and in the case of Mexico, international agreements that allocate the finite Colorado river water supplies based on faulty, now obsolete, information. It is a real problem.
What measures do you take now, knowing this information?
If you look at the US Drought Monitor, it is obvious the problem is not limited to the Colorado River. We are in a mega-drought, so cutbacks are being imposed by federal and state water agencies to encourage agricultural, urban, and commercial water users to cut their water use and, and stretch finite supplies as much as possible through conservation efforts.
In California, we have the State Water Resources Control Board, the state water regulator in California, and they have issued curtailment orders. Meaning, they have told water rights holders, many of whom have had those water rights for over a hundred years, that, for the first time, the water that they feel they are entitled to, is not available. Local water districts are also issuing water conservation mandates; the San Francisco water department is doing that, in Los Angeles, the metropolitan water district, is urging urban users to curtail their efforts.
And then agriculture. Agricultural users — farmers and ranchers — have had to get water rights in many cases through the federal government, as the federal government is the operator of these water projects. They have contracts with water users, individual farmers, ranchers, or districts, and they are now issuing curtailment orders. They're saying, we know you contracted for X amount of water for this calendar year, but we are telling you because of the drought shortages we don't have that water to supply. Our reservoirs are low at Lake Shasta or at the Oroville Dam.
When you drive from San Francisco to LA on the five, you see a lot of signage from the agricultural farming community about water. There's apparently some frustration about this. What are the other options for them?
About 80% of all human consumed water goes to agriculture. That is by far the biggest component of water use, as opposed to 20% used for urban and commercial, and industrial purposes.
Over the years, ranchers and farmers, and agricultural water districts assumed that the water would always be there — as we all do.
And the farmers and ranchers have, in hindsight, exacerbated the problem by bringing more and more land into production. You see on those drives between San Francisco and Los Angeles, particularly in the San Joaquin Valley, all these orchards are being planted. Orchards are more lucrative crops than row crops — cotton, alfalfa, and rice. But, if you are growing a row crop, you can leave the land fallow in times of drought.
We don't have to plant. If the water stopped there, or if it's too expensive to get, it may make economic sense, but if you have an orchard or a vineyard it's a high value, those are high value crops, you don't have that operational flexibility and they need to be irrigated in wet years and in dry years. Now, you see these orchards, which were only planted a few years ago, are now being uprooted because the farmers realized that they don't have the water necessary to keep those vineyards and orchards alive. For ranchers, the same thing is true with their herds. They don’t have enough water for their livestock.
The water shortage has never been drier than it is right now. Farmers and ranchers are being deprived of water that they traditionally believed was theirs and they're very understandably, very unhappy about it. They see it as a threat to their livelihood and to the livelihood of the folks who work for them. Their anger and frustration are to be expected, but it's nobody's fault.
To say, as some farmers do, that it is mismanagement by state and federal government officials, I think is overly simplistic and misplaced in the face of a mega-drought. Everybody's going to have to sacrifice. Everybody's going to have to be more efficient in how they use water. All sectors are going to need to be more efficient with the water that does exist.
Looking at this percentage breakdown of water use – is it actually important for individual users to change their water habits?
Well, every little bit helps. When you're talking about homeowners, about 70% of urban water use is for outdoor irrigation. So we're talking parks and cemeteries and golf courses and folks' yards. You know, that used to be considered part of that American dream and the California dream — you would have a big lawn in front of your house and behind your house. Truth be told, that has never made much sense in an arid environment. That's where the water savings in urban areas is critical in the way it really involves aesthetics rather than critical human needs, like water for drinking and bathing and sanitation purposes. There is a growing movement away from big lawns, and away from the type of landscaping that you see in the Eastern US — there is no drought in the Eastern United States. As Hurricane Ida and other recent storms have shown, the problem is too much water, or rather than too little in most of the Eastern United States. So it really is a tale of two countries.
We just need to recognize that the American West is an arid region. It has always been an arid region, we can't make the desert bloom with water that doesn't exist. We need to be more efficient in how we allocate those water supplies. And it seems to me in an urban area, the best way to conserve and most effective way is to reduce urban landscaping, which is the major component of urban water use.
You also write about water markets and making them better – for those who don’t know, what is the water market?
Water markets, that is, the voluntary transfer of water between water users, is more robust in some other Western states. Again Arizona and New Mexico come to mind. California somewhat surprisingly is behind the curve. We are in the dark ages compared to other states. Water markets are kind of anecdotal. There is not much of a statewide system. It is done at the local level, through individual transactions without much oversight and without much transparency. And I have concerns about all of those things.
I believe conceptually watermarks are a way to stretch scarce, finite water resources to make water use more efficient. I can, for example, allow farmers or ranchers to sell water to urban uses or commercial usage or factories in times of drought.
Farmers sometimes can make more money by farming water, than they can by farming crops.
There are efficiencies to be gained here.
The problem in my view is really one of transparency. The water markets are not publicly regulated, and some of the people who are engaging in water transactions like it that way, frankly, they want to operate under the radar.
In my opinion, water markets need to be overseen by a public entity rather than private or nonprofit entities. We need oversight and transparency, so that folks like you and myself can follow the markets to see who's selling water to whom, for what purpose, and make sure that those water transfers serve the public interests and not just the private interests.
There have been a number of stories in the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal and the Salt Lake City Tribune about efforts in some parts to privatize water transfer. Hedge fund managers are buying and selling water, as a means of profiting. And it strikes me that when you're talking about an essential public resource — and in California, it is embedded in the law that public water is an inherently public resource, that water is owned by the public and it can be used for private purposes, but it is an inherently public resource — the idea of commoditizing water through the private, opaque markets is very troublesome to me. I think it represents a very dangerous trend and one that needs to be corrected and avoided.
Why is California so behind?
There's no good reason for it. It's largely inexplicable that since the state was created on September 9th, 1860, we've been fighting over water. In the 19th century, it was miners versus farmers ranchers. In the 20th century, with the growth of urban communities, the evolution of California into one of the most populous states with 40 million Californians, it has been a struggle between urban and agricultural uses of water.
In the second half of the 20th century, there was a recognition that some component of water had to be left in streams to protect ecosystems, landscape, and wildlife, including the threatened and endangered wildlife. That suggestion has made agricultural users in California angry. You will see those signs that allude to the idea that food and farming are more important than environmental values. I don't happen to believe that's true. I believe both are critically important to our society. But the advocates for the environment have a proverbial seat at the water table. So that's another demand for water allocation that exists.
Do you maintain optimism?
Yes. I think it's human nature to look on the bright side. I try to do that through research scholarships and teaching. There are models for how we can do this better in the United States. Israel and Saudi Arabia and Singapore are far more efficient with their water policies and efforts. Australia went through a severe megadrought. They came out of it a few years ago, but they used that opportunity to dramatically reform their water allocation systems. That's an additional model. I think most people would agree in hindsight that their previous system was antiquated, and not able to meet the challenges of climate change and the growing water shortage in some parts of the world.
Here in the United States, we can learn from those efforts. There are also some ways to expand the water supply. Desalination for one. Again, Singapore and Saudi Arabia have led the world in terms of removing the salt content from ocean water and increasing water supply that way. In Carlsbad, California, north of San Diego, we have the biggest desalination plant in the United States right now, and that is currently satisfying a significant component of the San Diego metropolitan areas’ water needs. It's more expensive than other water supplies, but the technology is getting more refined, so the cost of desalinated water is coming down at a time when other water supplies, due to shortages and the workings of the free market are going up.
At some point, they're going to meet or get closer. Unlike some of my environmental colleagues, I think desalination is an important part of the equation.
In a proposal that came up in the recall election, one of the candidates was talking about how we just need to build a canal from the Mississippi River to California to take care of all our problems. That ignores political problems associated with that effort, as well as the massive infrastructure costs that would be required to build and maintain a major aqueduct for 2000 miles from the Mississippi to California. That's just not going to happen. Some of those pie in the sky thoughts of how we expand the water supply, I think, are unrealistic.
interviews
An Interview with Jeffrey Shumaker
by Max Moinian
May 31, 2018
Who are you and where are we?
My name is Jeffrey Shumaker and we are in Bryant Park by my office.
What’s your favorite privately-owned public (POP) space in Manhattan?
One of my favorites is Grace Plaza. It was recently renovated with an Amanda Burden touch: many types of seating, movable and fixed, and lots of planting. POPS can be controversial, viewed as privatizing public space. Unfortunately there are many POP’s I don’t like, built under the original rules which had virtually no design requirements whatsoever. These spaces need to serve the public, but we need somebody to own them, otherwise no one will take care of them. They’re often lost in limbo.
You mentioned Amanda Burden. What were her main goals that you aligned with during your time at the DCP?
I think the main thing she brought to the Department of City Planning and to the city was a pedestrian and human perspective. Even in the work we presented to her. They were otherwise generic diagrams about rezoning or changing a neighborhood. No surprise the community wouldn't understand what you were talking about. A lot of credit goes to Amanda and the Urban Design office in bringing the work down to the human, through sketching and clearly communicating intent on proposed changes. Not just from the air, from a helicopter view, but from the ground. That’s the vantage point that people live and experience the city from.
The intention is to make legible drawings. But does the act of drawing perspectives rather than plans change the design?
Absolutely. It definitely changes the design. It forces you to get into the qualities of things that only you as a person can really appreciate. When you draw from the air you’re focusing more on the roofs of buildings, mechanical, and other things. From the ground you start looking at use, transparency, materiality, street trees, the design of the sidewalk. All the things you wouldn’t see from above.
During your master’s at MIT, what was the urban crisis everyone was talking about?
That’s a good question. Compared to what’s happening in the world now, it was a relatively happy time. I worked with Dennis Frenchman on projects in China. I think the crisis was the rapid development of cities, and not necessarily in the best way.
What are some of your favorite planner jargons?
Resilience, sustainability, livability, equity. Not to say that they’re not important. With PlaNYC, the whole city was viewed through these lens and it was groundbreaking when it was first released in 2007. What I am saying is that
We should not be exclusive. You want people to understand the process so that they can advocate for better planning and design in their own communities.
Public realm is a good one. When you speak to communities often times they dont even understand what you’re talking about when you use the term “public realm.”
What’s the alternative?
Public life, public space, streets, parks -- call it what it is, what people can identify with.
Can you talk about autonomous vehicles (AV)?
Everything cycles back around. For example, street car designs might be useful for AV: the idea of dedicated zones to move efficiently. We’re looking at older streets to inform future ones. Maybe using different technologies now, but the design is essentially the same.
In this rendering, there’s no difference between the sidewalk and the road. There’s a kid on a scooter in front of a car. When you’re speculatively designing future streets, who is at the table and how is safety discussed?
Those renderings were very aspirational. There’s a big role for urban designers to play in preparing cities for this technology when it’s ready. There’s still a lot of work to do before we get to truly safe streets. And there’s always a risk that the technology may fail. But I think it’s important to be optimistic about what the future could be.
It’s a call to action.
Those renderings are part of a conversation we’ve been having with the City. To remind them that now is the time to lay the groundwork for this technology when it gets here.
Did the vision of a shared street start from another discipline? Is the car company telling you this is the vision?
It was very much internal. Based on my experience at the City and with DOT, but mostly internal. It was our idealized vision of what could be.
All of the major car companies have a research wing looking at the future city, showing nice images of pedestrian-friendly, smart cities. You have to wonder: what are they in it for? Are they sincere in wanting to make cities better for everybody? I think there’s a need for strong government and regulation to counter that.
I doubt you were talking about AV when you were in school. What do you think prepared you for this work?
Trends change, the terms we use change, but the fundamentals are the same. Fascinating to me now that I’m working internationally is that from the ground, cities are very similar. The character, design, and neighborhoods are different, and you celebrate those differences. But having places to sit, good sidewalks, plants, places of interest…that is everywhere.
Nanshan Center, by KPF
LVGEM Baishizhou Master Plan Shenzhen (c) KPF
Elements that every city needs, but is there a model that you can just drop on cities?
That’s a good question, and it’s a tough one. Good urban design principles may be basic to you and me, but sometimes it’s important to state the obvious.
What are the principles that carry over form public to private practice?
Certainly in this country, cities are fighting for every last dollar, and need to be smart about leveraging private development for the benefit of the public. New York has become an expert at this, for public space, subway improvements or waterfront access, there are many ways...
At the City, you can’t realize anything without the private sector. We depend on them for affordable housing, parks... But when you’re working for the City you’re a public servant. You are ultimately working for the public. In the private sector, you work for clients and you can only push things so far. But, no matter where you work, you are always trying to find a balance between doing what’s best for the private property owner and what is best for the city and the public.
Some people may think that government work is actually more restricted.
In a way, yes. There are many layers to it. A lot of the work we did was never shown publicly, it was really meant to keep the conversation going for us. Sometimes the City is your client, and that could be the best of both worlds. The smarter developers realize that generally what’s good for the city is good for the bottom line.
Planners have been repairing past mistakes. But now there’s a big shift into thinking about the future … I don't know if that existed as much before?
I haven't really thought of that. A lot of the work I was doing was essentially how do we bring a sense of urbanity back into places. Infilling surface parking, mixing uses… Now, given the challenges of climate change, technology, cities are just trying to keep up, let alone get ahead. It forces everybody to think differently, in more immediate and longer terms about where cities are going.
Is it cyclical? Or do we keep refining big waves?
Maybe the waves are getting smaller and faster. All the disruptive technologies are happening at a pace that cites can't keep up with. At least with the kind of zoning we have in New York, which is frankly old-fashioned.
Do you think there are too many rules?
Yes I do. The physical zoning resolution just keeps getting thicker and thicker. Its three very large volumes. We don't tend to take out, we just keep adding to it.
Was there a point where you shifted into thinking more about the future?
City agencies aren't necessarily known for being the most proactive or progressive, but the Bloomberg administration was different. The now famous Bloomberg pilot project: we don't have to change the rules to try it, and if it works, then we change the rules. A good example of this is micro-unit housing. We removed the minimum unit size requirement and held a design competition. Some very creative designs showed how outdated the rule was. Carmel Place was built and is very successful, and we ultimately changed the rule citywide.
What is going on in New York City right now?
I think the affordability crisis gives a sense of urgency that is understandable and warranted. There is a need to create lots of affordable housing fast. The rush is too fast for many neighborhoods. As much as everybody wants affordable housing, there is pushback. Anytime you talk about neighborhood change people get very defensive. Particularly when it’s their neighborhood. In theory everybody wants affordable housing and nobody wants to shut the door on newcomers.
But we’re at a tipping point: so many people want to be here, which shoots up prices. Even in East New York, the first neighborhood under the de Blasio administration to be rezoned. Investment was brought there for the first time in a very long time. And the minute the City announced its plans to rezone, speculators started buying and flipping property. Then you see the values go up, and up, and up. It’s a tough issue. Cities have gotten so expensive and exclusive. If people can’t afford to live here, what kind of city are you left with?
Are you a fan of infill development projects?
Yes. I think it achieves a lot of urban design goals. I think most would agree now that the tower in the park model was just anti-urban. It created campus conditions. You're either in it or you're not. And in talking to NYCHA residents and tenant associations over the years...there is a strong sense of us vs. them, people who live in the development vs. those who live outside. That’s not an urban position.
I understand the defensive nature against an infill proposal and the valid fear of losing one’s home, but the status quo is just not sustainable. Without more Federal money, NYCHA has to figure out how to generate income on its own. I think there's a way to do it that could keep everyone in place, probably even add affordable housing along with market rate units. Create better communities with less space -- better quality, not quantity. So they're not campuses. So they're part of the urban fabric.
Do you think there’s a need for more private planning firms?
Definitely. There are very few firms you could go to for planning and urban design that really get it. That understand and focus on the zone between the city and regional scale and the building scale. I think ultimately more firms and more competition is better for cities.