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
The Floor Below Which No One Should Fall
by Nika Soon-Shiong
May 25, 2021
This interview with Nika Soon-Shiong, Co-director of the Compton Pledge, was conducted and condensed by franknews. This article was originally published in November 2020.
Nika | My name is Nika Soon-Shiong. I'm the Executive Director of The Fund for Guaranteed Income, as well as Co-director of the Compton Pledge.
frank | And what are both of those things?
The Fund for Guaranteed Income is an organization that I have been working towards for the past five years. My initial plan was to launch it after I finished my PhD on cash transfer implementation systems, but it really feels like now is an unprecedented time for more radical political visions and policies to take root.
The Compton Pledge is the fastest-launched and most robust city-led guaranteed income initiative in the United States. It is implemented by the Compton Community Development Corporation and The Fund for Guaranteed Income, in partnership with the Jain Family Institute. A Community Advisory Board is guiding the design and implementation
In what ways is the city of Compton involved?
Mayor Brown is a founding member of the Mayors for Guaranteed Income led by Stockton’s Mayor Tubbs. Mayor Brown’s leadership and commitment to healing justice is incredibly important to the Compton Pledge.
Aja Brown (Los Angeles News Group)
Our goal is to make the case for new government policies at a municipal, state, and federal level, so the city's involvement is crucial. The Pledge itself, however, is not financed by the city. It is funded philanthropically.
How do you decide who is qualified to be a recipient? How many people are you looking to include and what are you budgeting per person?
We are using a combination of public government and community-based organizations data to select 800 low-income residents to receive the cash transfers. The exact amount received by each participant will vary based on household size. Each participant will receive at least several hundred dollars, and parents with children will receive greater amounts. The frequency of distribution will also vary, but participants will be informed at the outset about the timing of their expected payments so that they can plan accordingly.
And how long does this go on for?
It's a two-year program.
800 people is a large number for a pilot program, but obviously a fraction of the city of Compton itself. How are you choosing who gets to participate?
We have an independent research team that is selecting the participants in order to have an inclusive subset of the city of Compton. So, for example, if there are x percent of formerly incarcerated people in Compton, then there would also be x percentage of the 800 that are formerly incarcerated. The reason for choosing 800 people as the sample number has to do with statistical power. We want to ensure that this is really representative of what a future city policy could and should look like.
Why Compton?
It is a city that is 30% black, and 68% Latinx. In many ways, it's the cultural capital of the world. At the same time, white flight, intentional divestment, and the looming threat of gentrification pose acute financial challenges. Unemployment rates have risen to 22% this year. There is an increasing number of Compton families relying on food pantries regularly for food. More than 23% of its 95,000 residents live below the federal poverty line. Compton is a city where racial and economic injustices intersect.
Other parts of the country or world face these systemic issues, but a motivating factor for The Fund for Guaranteed Income's first initiative being the Compton Pledge is the leadership of Mayor Brown, who has boldly linked the COVID public health crisis to the pervasive PTSD following decades of police brutality and mass incarceration of communities of color. She is standing with movements in the national rallying cry to defund the police and reinvest in communities. We are unapologetically trying new approaches to that second part of the equation: investing in communities.
What is the long-term political vision for The Fund for Guaranteed Income as it relates to the future of cash transfers in America? And do you think you ensure its success?
The long-term vision is to re-imagine social policy through a people-led process that crosses class, industry, and race. The aim is to redistribute wealth at scale and realize individuals’ inherent right to share in the nation's socially produced and inherited wealth.
What will make or break this ambitious vision for society and its institutions is an ability to coordinate with national movements and organizers, academics, policymakers, and politicians. A coalition of organizations like Black Lives Matter, One Fair Wage, National Council Essie Justice Group, A New Way of Life, Brotherhood Crusade have taken the pledge.
I was talking to Andrea James, the founder of the National Council for Incarcerated and Formerly Incarcerated Women and Girls, and she said this incredible phrase that I can't get out of my mind. She said, "Whether we win, lose, or draw, it’s a win for us. It's going to change things."
The conversation of what the government owes people has really shifted. In the 60’s Nixon was talking about wealth transfers. Clinton initiated welfare reform. Now, bills to provide families with relief during the largest pandemic we have ever seen are stuck in the Senate. How do we move forward? How do you sell this idea in such a politicized climate?
75% of Black Americans were excluded from Social Security when it began. There has been this continuous legal exclusion of Black people from the wealth-building apparatuses whether under the New Deal tax laws that relegate fewer resources to communities of color, or white flight and suburbanization under the name of urban renewal.
Pres. Clinton signing Social Security Independent Agency Act
We have this obsession with individualism and the myth of meritocracy. Universal access to education and health was once seen as an unsustainable dream, perhaps, and in America healthcare still might fall into that category. But now, largely, these things are seen as a right. And I think it's time to invest in guaranteed income as a right of all people. It's an investment in humanity.
How do you think politicians should be advocating for UBI? And do you think the CARES Act has made the idea more palatable?
The CARES Act has proved that when politicians believe we need to fund something, we find the money to fund it. On one hand, the CARES Act has strengthened the case for direct cash transfers. Still, it was a one-time transfer of $1,200 for adults and $500 for a child that left out millions of undocumented and formerly incarcerated people.
It exposed the frailty of the social safety net and the racial fault lines along which it cracks. I think that politicians should frame guaranteed income as a universal income floor for all residents of America, regardless of legal citizenship status, regardless of whether or not an individual has been formerly incarcerated.
As an organization, do you have any investment or interest in what people do with the capital they are given?
So much of this space has been focused on how people are spending the money. There have been lots of studies to empirically prove that people don't spend it on temptation goods and drugs and alcohol, and they don’t quit their jobs. And I think that question reifies the welfare stereotypes and racist tropes that have persisted throughout American perspectives on who is and is not deserving. For me, the real question is not how people spend the money, but how a system could justify denying people the breathing room that a guaranteed income would afford. Especially as massive amounts of public dollars fund a criminal legal system that drains government budgets and perpetuates the criminalization of poverty.
We're starting from the basis that the real question isn't: how do people spend the money, or: is this the right policy to pursue?
How can citizens in Los Angeles and the surrounding areas participate?
How can you pledge Compton? There are a number of ways. We have a donation page on our website, since we are raising for the cash disbursements, which will go directly to the individuals. You can show us love or share your story on Instagram and Twitter. But, really, you can reach out to your elected officials and pay attention to our policy agenda. The Compton Pledge plans to be passed as a local resolution of the BREATHE Act.
Right now the model is philanthropically funded. Are you hoping to move away from the philanthropy model as this broadens?
Yes. We have a team of people looking into the long-term financing of guaranteed income for the city of Compton, and they are coming out with a report on our plans to do so. It is a cross-institutional working group and there's a bigger conversation to be had about how it can be financed at the state level at the federal level.
It's interesting. The whole idea of philanthropy as a solution — it’s a starting point but feels like that model is also inherently part of the problem you are trying to address. The idea that redistribution is left up to the interest and will of people or institutions that have a lot of capital.
I completely take your point. I think the Fund for Guaranteed Income is challenging the assumptions of philanthropy itself. Like the notion that wealthy individuals are the natural experts when it comes to designing a more equitable future. It is certainly time for more sore winners in today’s economic system. If an individual decides that they want to redistribute all of their wealth to every single low-income individual in a city, well, we want to build a platform for them to do that and a coalition that will stand behind them.