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
From Cradle to Grave
by Deborah Thorne
September 20, 2020
This interview with Deborah Thorne, an associate professor of sociology at the University of Idaho, was conducted and condensed by franknews.
Deborah | I began studying consumer bankruptcy back in 1996 when I was a doctoral student at Washington State University. It was my dissertation topic. After I graduated, Elizabeth Warren contacted me and offered me a post-doc at Harvard, working on the Consumer Bankruptcy Project. So, we sold our house in Washington state and moved back to Cambridge. Now I'm one of the co-principal investigators on the CBP, along with two other fantastic colleagues--Bob Lawless at the University of Illinois and Pamela Foohey at Indiana University.
frank | How would you explain the Consumer Bankruptcy Project?
It's an ongoing study that originated in 1981 with Professors Elizabeth Warren, Terry Sullivan, and Jay Westbrook. The goal of the research has stayed the same: to develop a better understanding of who files for bankruptcy, why they file, where they file, and the circumstances under which they file.
There are a lot of different angles that you can take when it comes to studying the issue of consumer bankruptcy. It is certainly not a monolithic topic or experience. We have looked at it in terms of race. Elizabeth had a great piece 20 years ago about how bankruptcy is a women’s issue.
One of the things that has been really pulling at my heartstrings lately is the relationship between aging and consumer bankruptcy. Our data suggest that, since 1991, within the national population, there's been a considerable uptick in the rate of bankruptcy filers who are 65 and over. And within the bankrupt population specifically, our data shows that, during that same time frame, the percent of filers who are 65 or over has increased by 497%, almost five-fold.
What explains that increase?
One of the questions we ask in our survey is, what went wrong? What caused the bankruptcy? For older senior filers, the two leading causes are a drop in income and a rise in medical costs.
So many seniors reported a decline in income. Of course, we would expect some decline if only because they may be transitioning from employed to retired, but our data suggest that they just don't have enough to survive on. A lot of folks talked about having lost their retirement investments almost entirely in 2008 - they had 401ks instead of pensions their pensions converted to 401ks and they had no idea how to invest that money.
Even if they wanted to return to work to supplement their retirement income and even if they could physically manage it, it’s near impossible to get a new job at that age. That was a fairly common thread in their stories. They would say, “I’m approaching retirement age or I am at retirement age, but I am planning to work another 5 to 10 years.” Or they wrote about either being laid off or getting sick and then trying to go back to work to find a new job. No one wanted to hire them. It is hard to make it as an old person. We know that age discrimination is real.
The other issue that hits them particularly hard is the cost of healthcare - their medical bills and prescriptions.
That includes all of the other things that Medicare doesn't cover - prescriptions, dental, eye care, PT, and all the other crap. That is the out-of-pocket medical expenses on average. That is just insane.
Woah.
I know. I’m like, I am so screwed when I retire! I was taken aback when I first learned that.
The oldest respondent who participated in the research was 92 years old. How is that ethical? Many of the senior filers described feelings of shame and anger and discouragement in their stories because they believe they did everything right. And they did: they worked, they paid their taxes, they served their country. We heard from many veterans who found themselves in bankruptcy.
They are virtually unemployable, and many don’t have enough money to survive retirement. Their fear is palpable. Where are they going to go? What are they going to do?
Many also have a lot of credit card debt. Of course they do, but it’s not like they were spending recklessly on a credit card. Think about it--if their car breaks down, they don’t have any money, they put it on a credit card. They put prescriptions on a credit card.
What happens to debt when they reach the end of their lives?
It goes away. Unless it's been co-signed. Otherwise, it just disappears. If they own a home or property, and there is some equity, creditors can put a line on it. And collect when the estate is sold.
It's strange then that there would not be age-specific debt forgiveness.
It is, isn’t it? No, instead we have reverse mortgages.
What is that?
You know, the ones that Tom Selleck pushes on TV. I'm like, you son of a bitch. I can’t believe he’s promoting this.
Basically, if you're retired and have equity in your home, you can essentially sign over the deed to your home, the company pays your monthly mortgage, and you continue to live in the house. That's probably where Mark, my husband, and I will end up. We are older, we don’t have any kids, and we'll never have this house paid off. In our later years, we’ll be like, “Okay, sign the house over to them so they'll pay my mortgage every month and I can afford to live here until I die.” And then they own it.
That's crazy.
It is crazy. And in the advertisement, Tom Selleck is saying that “this is the way you can enjoy your retirement.” Older Americans should not have to go to that extreme to enjoy their retirement.
We had a time in this country where there was a better social safety system. Sure, it was mostly for white males, I’ll give you that, but we did ensure that a portion of the population retired comfortably. Full Social Security benefits used to start at 65, now it’s at 67. Medicare used to cover more than it does now. We had pensions instead of 401ks. That safety net was the result of policies, and it has been unraveled by policies. What kind of a nation are we when we say good luck making it for the next 20 years to those who have the fewest options?
What happens to your life after you declare bankruptcy? And does the treatment vary based on the reasons that you file?
No, different reasons for filing don’t result in different outcomes. No one is going to cut you a break if you filed because of medical debt rather than credit card debt. It doesn’t matter why you file for bankruptcy. For the most part, bankruptcy is bankruptcy.
There are two types of consumer bankruptcy. Generally speaking, people will file a Chapter 7 if they have no assets--like if they don’t outright own a home. Chapter 7s make up about 65% or 70% of the consumer cases. So, for example, if you don’t own a home, but you have a lot of credit card debt, then you would probably file a Chapter 7. You pay your attorney around $1200, they file the petition, assuming no issues, your debts are discharged, and you’re done. Takes a couple of months.
Chapter 13 is mostly for people who have considerable assets, like a home that they want to keep. But they have to be able to continue to pay the mortgage while they are in bankruptcy. Chapter 13 is essentially a multi-year, usually five year, repayment program. Families are in bankruptcy for five years - and during that time, every dime of extra, expendable income they have, goes to repay their creditors. The budget that they are required to live on is beyond unforgiving. Creditors don’t get anything in chapter 7, but they get a little bit back in Chapter 13.
A lot of people, when they file bankruptcy, assume that Chapter 13 is the more moral thing to do compared to Chapter 7. That is the narrative that's out there, namely that people who file Chapter 7s are just walking away from their bills, but at least people who are filing Chapter 13s are trying to repay their bills.
The judge or your creditor or future creditors or employers or landlords, they see bankruptcy as a bankruptcy. They don't care how you got into it, and they don't care if it's a Chapter 7 or a Chapter 13.
Right. What does filing bankruptcy do to your credit?
Your FICO score takes a hit, probably several hundred points. Keep in mind though, that most people who end up in bankruptcy have been struggling financially for quite a while, so it’s likely they have a poor credit score to begin with. Most people will continue to try and try to make their finances work for years before they file for bankruptcy.
As someone who's been studying this issue for decades, and who is somewhat removed from their pain, it is easy for me to say that they should've filed right off the bat. When it becomes clear that the only thing that will save you from bankruptcy is winning the lottery or the death of a rich relative, you really need to consider filing.
Look, if you are drowning in debt because of a terrible illness, it’s unlikely that things are going to turn around quickly enough. If you are unemployed at 67, and that is what is pushing you into bankruptcy, you’re probably not going to get a job that will pay enough for you to avoid filing. But people will say, “You never know. Maybe I will get a better job. I don’t want to file. I keep hoping that things will turn around.”
Right.
The reason that so many of these bankrupt seniors have this debt in the first place is because we have such a crappy social support system. If we had a humane healthcare system, like virtually every other damn country in the world, people wouldn't end up with massive medical bills.
And why the hell should they transfer their wealth to these corporations? I really struggle with that. I get the whole idea of, you're supposed to pay your bills and blah, blah, blah. But if the bills originate from such an unjust system, such a predatory system, should we extract the wealth that is supposed to keep older Americans afloat during retirement years just to ensure more profit for some already-bloated corporation? I don't know. It doesn't seem right.
What percentage of bankruptcies stem from medical debt?
When we did the last study, it was over 50%.
Wow, that is high.
It is high. And medical debts can grow exponentially, almost at the blink of an eye. And it doesn’t take a catastrophic illness or injury to create that debt. Maybe your kid needs insulin. Maybe you lose your job, so you lose insurance, and then you need a routine appendectomy. Often, the cost of physical therapy isn’t covered--and it’s not cheap. How do you afford the most basic things?
People are really detached from the concept of luck and money. Insanely tragic things with huge financial costs can happen to anyone at any time.
Right. And terrible things do happen.
Dr. David Himmelstein, who was a researcher on the Consumer Bankruptcy Project, pointed out that even as economically privileged as he is, if someone in his family was ill or injured and needed long-term physical therapy, he too would be facing bankruptcy. His point was that virtually no one, regardless of their economic standing, is immune.
What are you paying attention to in terms of policy?
The policy conversation that weighs most heavily on my mind right now is actually the student loan debt issue.
Students today are so, so buried in debt. Their debt is negatively affecting our economy and society--they cannot afford homes, they cannot afford new cars, they cannot afford to put money into retirement, they really cannot afford kids. And those who want to pursue an advanced or professional education, education that benefits all of us, well, they cannot afford that either.
In addition to being a social good, a college degree is often necessary to attain a job that will bring in any sort of income.
Absolutely. They're damned if they do, and they're damned if they don't. And they know it. But they feel like they have no choice--to have any shot at a good job, they need that credential.
I talk about this with my students in every class I teach. They figure out how much they are going to have in student debt, what their monthly payments will be, and for how long, and then we discuss the costs associated with living a middle-class life. How will they be able to come up with a down payment for a house? How much is a decent car? Do they want kids? How much is daycare? Childcare costs are craziness. If they don’t have health insurance through their employer, can they afford private coverage? They are paralyzed once they start to realize what they are shouldering in debt. They are really discouraged, frightened, and sad.
We want them to be educated. We want doctors and we want scientists and we want teachers. We expect all these things, but we don't want to pay for it. And I think it's just horrific. Absolutely horrific.
I think student debt cancellation is a smart economic policy...not to mention humane. Even if you only want to think about this from an economic perspective, canceling debt would free up so many people to participate in the economy. But no, we refuse to do that. Fine. But I think it is economically and ethically wrong to keep so many current and past students in massive debt. It is shortsighted.
It is so overwhelming, and in many areas getting worse.
It is. It is getting worse. It's incredibly heavy, and it is affecting people in every age group. And this is just the tip of the iceberg - these are just the people who have actually filed bankruptcy. There are a lot of people who still are living in major financial distress who have not yet turned to bankruptcy.
We burden students with student loan debt, debt that they cannot discharge in bankruptcy. The cost of health insurance and healthcare is increasing, which hits middle-aged families particularly hard, especially if they have children. And older Americans no longer have the security of a pension, but rather they must manage the risk of a 401k. It's from cradle to grave.
We've enacted and implemented policies over the last 30 or 40 years that have put people in very high-risk circumstances. Thank goodness for the current turmoil and protesting in our country because it has exposed so much. It’s easy to get pretty discouraged when I research and write about the financial struggles of so many Americans. But it is not entirely hopeless.
You can reverse policy. We know that we have had better policies in the past and that it hasn't always been this risky to live in this country. It's been better and we know that it can be again. This isn't inevitable. It is not an accident that we are where we are. The potential for change, that leaves me a little more hopeful.