The Palm Springs region and its 400,000 residents and 124 golf courses aren’t gobbling up an extreme chunk of Colorado River supplies, as many assume. It’s blessed with huge underground aquifers that are tapped with an efficient water infrastructure that has drawn admiring looks for decades. Its residents, tourism industry and business community have deeply benefited from state laws that require water rates to be linked to the actual cost of providing water.

This is from a 1991 Los Angeles Times story during the last major California drought:

PALM SPRINGS — Like a mirage lurking in a dip in the highway, Palm Springs shimmers enticingly atop the Sonoran Desert, an impossibly green splotch on a canvas of tawny brown.

 

Outside the city, the flat, sandy landscape is broken only rarely by scraggly tamarisk trees, yucca plants and pathetic shrubs twisted by relentless desert winds.

 

But in town it’s another world, with lush grass and petunias lining the boulevards, fountains gurgling outside local landmarks and shaggy palms swaying soothingly in the breeze. There are even misters on several restaurant patios, which shower diners with a fine, tropical spray.

 

For visitors from drought-stressed corners of California, the dramatic contrast provokes instant suspicion: Is this artificial oasis hogging water while folks in other regions are skipping showers?

 

It does look suspicious, but appearances can be deceiving. The truth is, Palm Springs — which gets just 5 inches of rain annually and sweats out 120-degree temperatures most summers — sits atop a vast sea of ground water, which has been carefully managed and now insulates the city from the effects of drought.

Water rates a fraction of coastal cities

During the current drought, Palm Springs water officials are keeping a lower profile — and for good reason. The state government’s announcement Friday that it will put on hold some of the old rules that governed water apportionment in the Central Valley could foreshadow a full-on attack on labyrinth rules that assign water rights in thousands of communities.

But one still sees stories in the local press that underscore how much different — and better — things are in Palm Springs. Some articles in the Desert Sun talk about city officials stepping up water conservation efforts, but they seem to be more about creating a sympathetic appearance than in response to an actual need for conservation.

Articles such as this 2013 piece raise long-term concerns about overpumping, but they aren’t remotely as daunting as analyses looking at the state’s long-term water-supply picture. That’s because they include facts such as these:

The state Department of Water Resources in 1964 estimated that the aquifer, in the first 1,000 feet below ground, had a total capacity of at least 39.2 million acre-feet. Based on that estimate, the aquifer has lost about 13.5 percent of the total since the 1970s.

That’s not good news. But it’s nothing like the problems facing coastal water agencies and those in the Central Valley.

This hugely favorable status quo is why rates at the Desert Water Agency have barely budged in recent years. With a base rate of from $1.16 to $1.83 per 100 cubic feet of drinking water, depending on the community, Coachella Valley water bills are far less than those in San Diego County, which are based on a rate of over $4 per 100 cubic feet, or San Francisco (over $5).

Will we see water power plays?

Water politics in California have been fraught and ugly for decades. The movie “Chinatown” reflects the cutthroat atmosphere of 80 years ago, but the tactics of the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California in the 1990s are also jaw-dropping. When its largest client — the San Diego County Water Authority — began looking for new supplies, the MWD undertook what the Los Angeles Times called a “clandestine effort to discredit San Diego County water leaders.”

So it wouldn’t be surprising to see wealthy communities in Silicon Valley and the MWD agitate for a statewide market in water, disguising a grab for cheaper water supplies as a “for the greater good” policy change. The economic argument for such markets is clean and lean. But the history of California was shaped by the complex water rights system left over from a century ago. There would be no Palm Springs as we now know it if water rates in the region were affected by outside factors.

A change in basic water rights isn’t just an existential threat to the economy of the Coachella Valley. It would imperil Imperial Country, the mini-agricultural juggernaut in the state’s southeastern corner that thrives because of cheap, grandfathered water rights.

Brutal battles loom in coming years. But in the short term, what we’re likely to see is more bureaucratic maneuvers. This is from the L.A. Daily News via the San Jose Mercury-News:

“… as the long hot summer drags on, more curtailments are likely to affect those who hold even older rights,” said Caren Trgovcich, the board’s deputy director.

“We are continuing to evaluate the hydrology in watersheds. There could be additional action” as early as next Friday, she said.

The mayors, city managers and city council members in the Coachella Valley and Imperial County are likely to be paying close attention.

The Republican minority in the Legislature even is pitching in. Assemblyman Dan Logue, R-Marysville, is pushing Assembly Bill 1445, a proposed $5.8 billion water bond to be put on the Nov. 2104 ballot to build two new dams and address Central Valley water quality.

Logue maintains his bill contains no pork and is the only water bond being discussed that would fund two dams.

California voters have not passed a water bond since 2006.  The Legislature in 2009 voted to put an $11 billion water bond on the Nov. 2010 ballot. But the Legislature then postponed the vote twice because of almost certain defeat by voters and questions about funding of pork.

That bond is back again this November — unless the Legislature again postpones it. If that bond ends up passing, Logue said, it would allocate only 25 percent of the funding, about $2.8 billion, for water storage.

“Two-times the water at half of the price, is what I call it,” Logue said in an interview of his own, cheaper bond proposal. He explained that, of the $5.8 billion in AB1445, $1 billion would be allocated to improving water quality, especially in the Central Valley. “We can use this bond money to pay for projects that will improve water quality, enhance our ability to protect ecosystems and reserve water for emergency situations,” he said.

Scrap High-Speed Rail and build reservoirs 

“Water is the most important issue facing California today,” Logue said. “I’ve called on the governor to scrap High-Speed Rail and put that money into building reservoirs.”

However, in his State of the State address last week, Gov. Jerry Brown continued to push for the HSR, whose total cost would be at least $68 billion.

“California potentially faces the driest winter in 500 years and water needs to be the top priority in 2014,” Logue said. “Reservoirs are drying up, farmers are losing their crops and it’s just getting worse.”

Logue explained that, because the state’s entire economy relies on an adequate and healthy water supply, legislators need to get to work immediately with Brown to find long-term solutions.

“California’s current water system provides water capacity for for 10 million people — we have 38 million in the state,” Logue said.

How Logue’s bond money would be spent

The two dams funded would be in the North of the state and near Fresno. “The money from my water bond will specifically be used for the storage of ground and surface water and this water can then be used for a variety of reasons, and it has the area of origin protection in the bond,” Logue said. “This will let us store it and use it for the ultimate benefit of Californians.”

If AB1445 is not passed by the Assembly, Logue may try putting his bond on the ballot with signatures.

And he has experience with ballot initiatives.  In 2010, Logue wrote and qualified for the ballot Proposition 23, after acquiring 800,000 signatures. It would have repealed AB32, the Global Warming Solutions Act of 2006, unless unemployment dropped. Voters rejected it and unemployment remains higher than the national average.

Logue stressed how important his water bond is and said it should have been done 10 years ago. If it doesn’t pass, he warned, “the Central Valley will turn into a dust bowl.”

Other water bond bills

The Democratic supermajorities in the Legislature also are coming up with new water bonds.

AB4 is by State Sen. Lois Wolk, D-Davis, and is quite different from Logue’s bill. It would fund $6.5 billion in water projects. According to a Daily Republic story, the bond would be geared more toward the concerns of environmentalists: wastewater recycling, groundwater storage, regional and local water supply development and Delta ecosystem restoration and stronger levees to improve water delivery.

AB1331 is by Assemblyman Anthony Rendon, D-Lakewood. Its $6.5 billion would fund projects related to water supply reliability, water quality, Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta sustainability, watershed conservation and protection and water recycling.

The bill will have its first hearing in the Assembly Natural Resources Committee in March.