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
Keep Our Students Enrolled
by Paula Umaña
April 27, 2020
Paula Umaña is the Community Impact Director at the Hope Center. Prior to this role, Umaña worked at Community College of Philadelphia as the director of Single Stop, a service that is geared towards increasing student retention by providing assistance in navigating and obtaining additional financial resources and supportive services.
What is the overall mission of the Hope Center and what are your main goals?
Hope Center is an action research center focused on rethinking and restructuring higher education using a systemic change approach to create opportunities for all students to complete their education. We believe that students are humans first. Through research we bring light to the basic needs and insecurities they face including housing, food, childcare, transportation, and mental health services.
We also work to redefine the framing of what it means to be a student-ready college through the #RealCollege movement, which grounds the conversation in real experiences of real college students. We use this term to talk about what people label as "marginalized" or "underserved" students, to acknowledge that the issues students face are not unique to a specific group. The economics of college are very different from what many perceive (not to mention the effect of the pandemic), and those labels fail to dignify students’ experience in dealing with a system that does not set them up for success. We designed an instrument to understand what life looks like for college students and have collected data for five years. In our latest report, we surveyed more than 400 public institutions, including both community colleges and four year universities.
How have things changed for the organization since COVID?
Since COVID, of course, these needs have not gone away, they just were compounded by this crisis. In response, we are being very vocal about the need for policies that make sense. We have designed guides and webinars as resources for colleges to help them plan strategically so students remain enrolled and able to return. We also created resources for students to help them cope with the crisis and connect with assistance that they likely did not anticipate they would need. This is a new field for everyone. Demonstrating that we care for our students will be fundamental to help them have both a sense of belonging and as well as the ability to remain in school and complete their education so they can be better equipped to join the workforce.
Our life at the Center changed completely with the pandemic. Prior to the quarantine, we were working to release some reports, including analyses on interesting initiatives that are running on campuses like meal vouchers and transportation. We just released “Hungry to Win” a report that looks at athlete students' basic needs and insecurities, and we have released a report on students who are parents. We really want to understand how the crisis affects students at all of these different levels. And again, we are not just looking at Pell Grant recipients, or students who fall into the traditional buckets of need for additional support. We are looking at #RealCollege students who are sacrificing to get their education up to a level where they can make livable wages.
And what do situations look like for those students?
We know that the college students that colleges are dealing with now, are not the stereotypical 18 to 22 year olds who live with their parents, and come to school with parental support. When a college closes, not everyone is able to go back home and take their classes online on their computers. Prior to COVID, a third of students lived on campus. Those students may or may not be able to have shelter in place.
We are advocating for colleges to create partnerships, offer emergency aid, and help students strategize alternatives. When I was working at Community College of Philadelphia, I worked with students whose housing insecurity was so prevailing that we would spend weeks to help them secure sustainable options and provide resources to help them create a safety net so they could finish their degree and even look into transfering to a four year institution where they could have room and boarding. For colleges like CCP that have no on campus housing, that possibility does not exist for them, which makes the work harder.
The reality of food insecurity has become evident through this crisis. You see endless lines at food pantries on the news. We are very strongly pushing out information about food stamps because students often don’t know that they can qualify and get a monthly benefit in an easy to use card. Recently the Food and Nutrition Service denied the requests from 29 states to waive certain requirements to support college students in getting food stamps. We were vocal and made a statement denouncing this position because, now more than ever, the modest sum of money that food stamps offer can help students with food security needs.
Based on our research findings, 64% of students work. The jobs that allow them to accommodate their schedule and family lives are often service industry jobs. And if they are in these jobs, now, they can’t work because many of these businesses had to close during the quarantine. Before COVID, students already had to make very hard financial choices: whether to buy a book or whether to eat, whether to pay rent or pay tuition. Financial aid doesn't always cover the real cost of college. The assumption that the cost of attendance is just tuition and college fees is unrealistic. The biggest price tags of attending college are housing and food. Not to mention that not everyone has access to a computer, not everyone has internet access. When you don't have income, when you don't have a way to pay your phone, which is how many students get their homework done, when you don't have wifi because you cannot go to campus to get free wifi or the library because they're closed, then how are you supposed to get a good grade, keep your financial aid, and continue with your studies?
What do you anticipate the lasting impact of this will be? What will carry over once this is behind us, and what do you anticipate the work will need to be?
College was not affordable for 75% of the students attending before COVID. That means that students need to take out loans to make it - not always in significant amounts because we aren't talking about Ivy League students. But if they drop out or are unable to pay for tuition because they have no income, their ability to repay those loans will be compromised. When the economy is shut down, when students are living or reliving traumatic experiences, when they are uncertain and have no control over the circumstances, their outlook of their possibilities will look markedly different.
The situation with parenting students is also very worrisome. There are some support systems to help students pay for expenses associated with their children’s care, but right now, none of those systems are in place because of the quarantine, so students have to perform these functions while doing homework, learning how to navigate online classes, and managing their children’s educational needs. And students who are parents of older children are also experiencing their own set of traumas. These children are also trying to figure out how their transition to college will look like, are trying to cope with the social factor and, in many situations, are questioning if college is even an option once they graduate from high school. This uncertainty of what life is going to look like takes a huge toll on people's mental health and on people's ability to cope with what is coming next.
And then there is the question about the ability to access healthcare. You have different systems, not everyone qualifies or knows how to get Medicaid, or much less understand how the special enrollment period can grant them access to coverage through the marketplace. There are a few states that have opened their marketplace exchange, but there is not enough publicity about it. We have people who had health issues prior to COVID, and their issues are being exacerbated by the pandemic. You have domestic violence going on. How do you deal with students who are in a housing situation where domestic violence is jeopardizing their wellbeing and they don't have a campus to go to, to talk to a counselor and get support. So it's a very complex moment, indeed.
With everything moved online for the foreseeable future, are students receiving what they're paying for? And how can that be addressed?
With the stimulus package, $14 billion is directed towards higher education. $1 billion goes to minority serving institutions, $300 million goes to colleges directly affected by the coronavirus, and $12 billion goes to colleges.
Let's take California for example. $1.7 billion dollars is going to the state. When institutions look at how they will maximize these dollars to help students, it is important that they consider not only those who are graduating, but also those returning to school or enrolling for the first time. We recently put together an emergency aid guide to provide pointers to colleges on how to best distribute funds in a sustainable way that makes sense, especially for those who are not captured by the financial aid markers.
In these times, higher education institutions have to really prove their adaptability to properly respond to this crisis. They have to move online. They have to deploy computers to students, create that infrastructure, and work with faculty who are used to teaching their classes physically. On top of all of that, they have to sort out giving aid and creating a system of prioritizing and identifying who needs it. Our guide addresses how to best distribute aid. Is it just cutting checks? Is it using only the data that the financial aid officers have on who receives Pell?
Part of what we address is, how can you give the aid to people who are finishing the semester and bring them back to school in August. What do you do with that financial aid and emergency aid money so that students in August know that they can come to school? New college enrollees should also have access to some of the aid so get started with their education. The financial aid that is going to be distributed needs to help everyone across the board in a sustainable way. We cannot just give cash out as it comes, and have colleges burn through it by the end of summer. Our guide talks about making decisions that are sustainable and that address not only the needs of those identified by the Pell Grant, or those who are qualified as "low income", or those who are captured in the system, but also to those who are not captured by the system.
Is there a component of this that we're overlooking that you think would be a mistake to sort of not give extra attention to?
Right now, public benefits do not take into consideration college students in a way that considers their reality. In a majority of the country, students have to work in order to get food stamps, they cannot just be full time students. The same goes in certain states for Medicaid. I think that we're missing out on the whole possibility of creating a very base layer of support for college students with public benefits.