We have two requests this week.
1) SB222 and SB223 – Prevent Water Shutoffs
Call Senator Susan Eggman today at 916-651-4005 and urge her to support SB222 and SB223. 500,000 Californians are facing water shutoffs coming out of the pandemic and ratepayers have $1 billion of water debt presently. These bills would help low-income families pay their bills and keep their water on. Senator Eggman is a champion of mental health services; being able to pay bills eliminates a great deal of mental stress on struggling families and goes hand-in-hand with physical health during a pandemic.
2) Bay-Delta Plan Delays Must End
Despite efforts by environmental partners, Northern California Tribes, and our own climate water advocates, the State Water Resources Control Board is not moving with a sense of urgency to protect the Bay-Delta’s fisheries from extinction or working to ensure that enough flow moves through the Delta to reduce harmful algal blooms during this drought.
We need emails to be sent to Chair Joaquin Esquivel Joaquin.Esquivel@waterboards.ca.gov asking him to move forward with the Bay-Delta Plan. Remind him that Governor Newsom and Natural Resources Agency Secretary Crowfoot promised voluntary agreements that would be better than the Bay-Delta plan for estuary protection — not equal to the Bay-Delta plan — but better. The probability of adequate flows being set through a “voluntary” process to heal the estuary, during a drought, with reservoirs at record low levels, is close to zero. We need the Bay-Delta Plan to move forward because temporary urgent change petitions (part of drought emergency measures) will take too much water from the Delta, while inflows diminish to a trickle.
We are on the precipice of a Delta disaster and the State Water Resources Control Board, under Chair Esquivel’s leadership, is procrastinating. Also please remind Director Esquivel that the Delta has one of the largest environmental justice communities in the state, just like he grew up in, and our communities deserve protection from degraded waterways and related air pollution, just like other communities in the San Joaquin Valley and Southern California.
Thank you for your support with these efforts. Let’s save the estuary. Let’s make sure all Californians have affordable water for sanitation and drinking. Everything else during a drought and pandemic is secondary.
Yours in solidarity,
Barbara Barrigan-Parrilla