Drought
From: Steve Fleischli,
Sacramento Bee
President Barack Obama visits
Fresno today to highlight federal efforts to confront California's epic
drought, possibly our worst in 500 years.
Sitting in the heart of the San
Joaquin Valley, Fresno symbolizes the mounting stakes in this crisis - both for
our state, where agriculture accounts for 80 percent of our freshwater
consumption, and for the nation, which gets nearly half its fruit and
vegetables from California.
Coalition response... According to leading irrigation researchers at the Center for Irrigation
Technology and CSU Fresno, the actual amount of conservation potential from
California agriculture is about 300,000 acre feet, or about 1 percent, not
hundreds of billions of gallons as Steve contends. To get more water from
farmers would require massive land fallowing, which has consequences for our
food supply, jobs, economic stability and our quality of life.
Read the report here: http://www.californiawater.org/cwi/docs/CIT_AWU_REPORT_v2.pdf
From: Gerald Haslam, Sacramento
Bee
Over a mirror in a beer bar in my
hometown, Oildale, hung a sign: "We don't care how they do it in
L.A." It revealed a truth in that little San Joaquin Valley hamlet,
because folks really didn't care. Just north in Fresno, President Barack Obama
will be entering a part of California today that plays by its own rules and
expectations - Los Angeles and San Francisco (and maybe Sacramento) be damned.
The view in the state's
midsection is that the coastal communities are mere ornaments. Local folks are
tough, contrary and certainly self-serving, but also kind, generous and
innovative in equal turns. They are not easily impressed.
Coalition response... Unemployment in the Valley is at its lowest when the water projects
deliver the water they were built to deliver for the purpose stated in the
Reclamation Act: To irrigate the arid lands of the West. People seem to have
forgotten that over time.
Water Supply
From: Jennifer Medina, New
York Times
Fields that in any other year
would be filled with broccoli, melons and onions are instead dusty patches of
dirt. Farmers are calculating losses that add up with each arid day. Thousands
of farm workers who rely on paychecks for tending the fields are expected to go
unemployed this year.
"It's as worse as I've ever
seen it, I'll tell you that right now," said Bill Chandler, who runs a
nearly 500-acre farm, growing raisin grapes, peaches and almonds.
From: David Castellon, Visalia
Times-Delta
With water so heavily on the
minds of California farmers and ranchers attending this week's 47th Annual
World Ag Expo in Tulare, it seemed appropriate that one of Thursday's final
events was a forum to discuss the state's drought.
A group of Valley farmers and
leaders from some Valley communities lead off the event by stating how dire the
outlook is if the drought - the worst ever recorded in the state - doesn't end
soon.
From: Michael Doyle, Modesto Bee; Sacramento Bee
President Barack Obama is
bringing additional drought aid with him Friday, as he arrives in California's
stricken San Joaquin Valley.
The new assistance includes
sped-up livestock disaster assistance for California producers, provided under
a newly signed farm bill, as well as targeted conservation assistance,
watershed protection funds, additional summer feeding programs and emergency community
water grants.
From: Staff, San Diego Union-Tribune
Hallelujah: The White House,
House Republicans and Senate Democrats could finally act to help the
water-starved farmers of California's Central Valley.
The galvanizing force is the
state's severe drought. President Barack Obama arrives in Fresno on Friday for
a firsthand look at farmers' misery.
From: Jessica Calefati, San Jose Mercury News; Contra Costa Times
When President Obama visits
Fresno this afternoon to discuss California's historic drought, he will open
the federal government's checkbook and make tens of millions of dollars in aid
available to struggling farmers and communities.
Obama will unveil a $183 million
aid package that includes money for ranchers in California who have lost
livestock, communities that are running out of water and farmers that need help
conserving scarce water resources.
From: Scott Smith, Redding
Record-Searchlight
President Barack Obama will visit
California's drought-stricken agricultural heartland Friday to meet with
community leaders, farmers and others and to announce initiatives to help the
Central Valley.
Obama is scheduled to meet with a
round table of farmers, a group that has accused the federal government of
putting rivers and fish above their crops and livelihoods.
From: Staff, San Jose Mercury
News
Unless the president has found a
way to issue an executive order to make it rain, the residents of Fresno are
largely in for disappointment Friday when President Obama comes to town to
discuss the drought. There are no easy answers.
The president doesn't favor
California House Republicans' plan to destroy the Sacramento-San Joaquin River
Delta to give Central Valley farmers water for their crops. Nor should he. The
better option for Obama is to back the proposal pushed by Senate Democrats to
provide a limited amount of additional water to help Central Valley farmers
through the crisis.
No comments:
Post a Comment