<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN">
<HTML><HEAD>
<META http-equiv=Content-Type content="text/html; charset=windows-1252">
<META content="MSHTML 6.00.6000.16544" name=GENERATOR>
<STYLE></STYLE>
</HEAD>
<BODY bgColor=#ffffff>
<DIV>
<DIV class=headlines>
<H1><FONT size=3><A
href="http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/a/2007/10/12/national/a114723D62.DTL">http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/a/2007/10/12/national/a114723D62.DTL</A></FONT></H1>
<H1>AP IMPACT: Calif. Water Is Getting Worse</H1></DIV>
<P class=byline>By SAMANTHA YOUNG and ERICA WERNER, Associated Press Writers</P>
<P class=date>Friday, October 12, 2007
<SCRIPT language=javascript><!--
OAS_RICH('x90'); //--></SCRIPT>
</P><!--/.articletools-->
<DIV id=articlecontent><SPAN class="georgia md" id=bodytext>
<SCRIPT language=javascript type=text/javascript>
sfgate_get_fprefs();
</SCRIPT>
<P>(10-12) 15:51 PDT Sacramento, Calif. (AP) --
<P>
<P>The mighty river delta that supplies water to two-thirds of California's
population and serves as one of the most important wildlife habitats on the West
Coast is in worse shape than ever despite $4.7 billion in government
spending.</P>
<P>
<P>The ambitious venture launched seven years ago to restore and protect the
Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta has spent most of its budget on water projects
hundreds of miles away, according to an Associated Press review.</P>
<P>
<P>While many of those projects are regarded by environmentalists and
policymakers as worthwhile in their own right, they have done almost nothing to
achieve the main goals state and federal lawmakers laid out when they created
the California Federal Bay-Delta Program, or CalFed.</P>
<P>
<P>Scientists and politicians agree that native fish species continue to
plummet; pesticides, fertilizers and other pollutants are making the overall
water quality worse; invasive species of fish, clams, algae and other organisms
are still spreading; and the delta's antiquated earthen levees have not been
reinforced to withstand a major earthquake, something that could cause deadly,
catastrophic flooding and cut off water to millions of people for perhaps
years.</P>
<P>
<P>"CalFed's a dismal failure because — details aside — CalFed promised to
restore the delta," said Steve Evans, conservation director of Friends of the
River, an environmental group in Sacramento. "Overall, the delta today is worse
than it was seven years ago."</P>
<P>
<P>Joe Grindstaff, director of CalFed for the past two years, acknowledged:
"Fundamentally, the system we devised didn't work."</P>
<P>
<P>The pools, channels and marshes in central California where the Sacramento
River meets the San Joaquin River are the source of drinking water for 25
million Californians. Water is pumped from the vast, 1,153-square-mile delta and
delivered via aqueduct to booming Southern California, some 300 miles away, as
well as to the San Francisco Bay area, about 40 miles off.</P>
<P>
<P>Water is a precious resource in California, and in recent decades, farmers,
city dwellers and environmentalists have waged legal battles that have
threatened to interrupt or reduce the pumping of water from the delta.</P>
<P>
<P>CalFed was supposed to achieve four objectives: maintain a steady supply of
water from the delta; improve water quality; reduce the risks of a catastrophic
breach in the levees; and restore the ecosystem for plants and animals.</P>
<P>
<P>While CalFed was envisioned as a 30-year program, nearly all sides said they
had expected to see more improvement by now.</P>
<P>
<P>"It's tried to bring people to the table, but at the end of the day you have
to look at results," said Rep. Devin Nunes, R-Calif. "It appears that all the
problems have gotten worse."</P>
<P>
<P>Policymakers and environmentalists say the biggest danger is a levee collapse
that could devastate the countryside. And if the delta's environmental health
keeps declining, California could face more legal battles that could disrupt the
water supply in the nation's most populous state.</P>
<P>
<P>Already, partly because of CalFed's lack of progress, California's water wars
are flaring anew. Over the summer, a federal judge slapped limits on the pumping
of water from the delta to protect fish, raising fears of a statewide water
shortage next year.</P>
<P>
<P>AP's review found that some CalFed efforts have fallen short. For example,
the various agencies that carry out water projects under CalFed's aegis
initially proposed spending $950 million to eliminate mercury and other
contaminants from the delta water. But the agency has spent just 13 percent of
that — about $125 million — and produced little if any improvement in water
quality.</P>
<P>
<P>Fourteen California and federal agencies have access to CalFed money. But
CalFed does not have full authority over how the money is spent. Its 24-member
board, made up of state, federal and local officials as well as members of the
public, can only sign off on grant requests.</P>
<P>
<P>The $4.7 billion allotted to the program so far has been treated like a grab
bag by the agencies that have access to the money, with the vast majority of it
spent on hundreds of projects outside the six-county delta region.</P>
<P>
<P>Among the expenditures:</P>
<P>
<P>_ $113 million to improve the taste of tap water in Southern California,
hundreds of miles from the delta. (As envisioned by lawmakers, CalFed was
supposed to improve water quality at the source — in the delta itself.)</P>
<P>
<P>_ More than $40 million to tear down five dams along Battle Creek, about 160
miles from the northern point of the delta, to restore 42 miles of habitat for
salmon and steelhead trout.</P>
<P>
<P>_ $118 million on studies to build or expand dams in Northern and Central
California, three of which are outside the delta.</P>
<P>
<P>"Money was flying out the door all over the place," said Jeffrey Mount,
chairman of the CalFed science panel.</P>
<P>
<P>Supporters of the agency's spending say some of the peripheral projects —
namely, water recycling and conservation measures — have indirectly eased
pressure on the delta by generating enough drinking water for 4 million to 5
million people.</P>
<P>
<P>In one example, the rapidly growing Chino area in Southern California, more
than 300 miles from the delta, secured $1 million in CalFed money to help expand
a wastewater recycling plant instead of pumping water out of the delta.</P>
<P>
<P>"Everybody benefits by us reducing our demand for water out of the delta, so
that's how we qualified," said Richard Atwater, general manager of the Inland
Empire Utilities Agency.</P>
<P>
<P>Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., said in defense of CalFed: "CalFed was never
meant to be the be-all and end-all. It was a methodology to try to get the
federal government and the state working together."</P>
<P>
<P>___</P>
<P>
<P>Samantha Young reported from Sacramento, while Erica Werner reported from
Washington</P></SPAN></DIV></DIV></BODY></HTML>