Problems derail 800-home Lode project

Calaveras planning commission votes to deny application for Sawmill Lake project, which would convert natural resource lands to homes. The Record, December 16  Read More

Delta plan nears end; districts optimistic

The latest draft of a major state plan dealing with management of Delta watersheds looks better for the Mother Lode than previous ones, according to an expert working with local water agencies. The Delta Stewardship Council released a sixth and final draft of the Delta Plan late last week, and water law consultant John Mills is reviewing the lengthy and complicated plan for the Tuolumne Utilities District and Calaveras County Water District. Mills... Read More

Judge OKs Delta reservoirs project

Stored water would be pumped to Kern County; appeal likely By Alex Breitler December 06, 2012 Record Staff Writer A quarter-century-old plan to convert two Delta islands into reservoirs can move forward, a judge has ruled. But the San Joaquin County Board of Supervisors voted this week to appeal that decision. The Delta Wetlands Project would flood Bacon Island and Webb Tract while converting two more islands into wildlife habitat. In wet years, water... Read More

Lodging tax splits groups

Innkeepers feel targeted Depending on who is asked, a recently proposed increase in Calaveras County’s transient occupancy tax could be either a bump in hotel room rates – one paid by tourists and collected by room owners – or a spike in surcharges aimed at the rooms’ owners themselves. Ask a lodge owner, as the Visitors Bureau did last Wednesday, and the answer might get loud: “The Calaveras Lodging Association is absolutely opposed to... Read More

‘La Nada’: Anything from drought to deluge

What it means in California watersheds and snow-pack when we see no signs of La Niña or El Niño. Fresno Bee, November 24  Read More

Water management strategies help state deal with dry times

Groundwater banking and water transfers can help tide the state over in times of drought. Sacramento Bee op-ed, November 29  Read More

S.J. joins 11 other counties in support of Delta/Valley water projects

STOCKTON – Not all water issues in California cause all-out war. In one effort at water diplomacy, representatives from counties from the top of the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta to the bottom of the San Joaquin Valley put together a list over the past year of 18 flood-control, groundwater-recharge, environmental-restoration and other water related projects that they all could support. Besides defining common ground on what can be contentious... Read More

Enforcing Clean Water a struggle Critics call for stricter oversight of state’s waterways

The board in charge of enforcing the Clean Water Act has written hundreds of permits and issued more than $30 million in penalties since 1985. But the goals of the law – under which virtually every stream in San Joaquin County is considered polluted – remain unrealized after four decades. The Central Valley Regional Water Quality Control Board regulates polluters up and down the Valley, from large city treatment plants such as Stockton’s,... Read More

Completion of General Plan considered a top priority

New Calaveras Supervisors are eager to take board seats. Calaveras County supervisors shook off any hints of post-election paralysis last week; narrowly kick starting a long-awaited general plan update over loud objections from a pair of outgoing board members who fretted over handing the reins to a trio of board “unknowns” who won’t be seated until January. Read this article here: Calaveras Enterprise, November 20, 2012  Read More

Finance committee tackles water rate hikes

According to CCWD interim General Manager Lynn Gentry, rate increase feasibility studies are now more likely to be completed sometime next spring, setting back a timetable that would have proven “prohibitively costly to the district and burdensome to ratepayers.” Read Here  Read More