This pattern has played out repeatedly with the Delta Conveyance Project and the so-called voluntary water agreements, even as the Newsom administration has simultaneously pushed to speed approval of California Forever, a sprawling development proposal that carries its own set of red flags.

Increasingly, it feels as though billionaires, lobbyists and insiders within state government are the ones steering California’s future — not the residents who actually live with the consequences. This kind of governance denies Californians the transparency, due process and public input they are owed on decisions that reshape their communities.

So who ends up paying the price? Ordinary residents.

Take California Forever, which envisions bringing as many as 400,000 new residents to Solano County. The project would place enormous new demands on a water system that is already stretched thin, all without clearly established water rights in place. This is unfolding even as tribal nations continue fighting for water rights they’ve been denied for generations, while accusing state regulators of discriminatory practices.

Then there are the fisheries. Commercial salmon fishing was shut down for three straight years because of excessive water diversions that raised river temperatures and destroyed salmon eggs — a crisis that cost the fishing industry an estimated $45 million in 2023 alone. Salmon season finally reopened this year, but the underlying policies that caused the collapse remain untouched, and the voluntary agreements now being pushed threaten to make matters worse, not better.

Add the Delta tunnel project and the voluntary agreements to the mix, and the strain on California’s water system only intensifies. Now California Forever threatens to pile on even more pressure, as tech-industry billionaires seek water rights within a system that’s already failing to meet its existing obligations.

These same water-management decisions directly affect how much water remains for farmers in and around the Delta, many of whom are already watching their land and water supplies shrink. And through it all, Californians have largely been left out of the conversation. Communities deserve the right to shape their own economic futures — not have those futures dictated by wealthy outside interests.

Tribal nations and the communities bearing the brunt of these decisions deserve a genuine seat at the table when their way of life hangs in the balance.

Having watched water and land negotiations unfold in Sacramento over the past seven years, we can’t say we’re shocked by the secrecy that continues to define the Newsom administration’s approach. But that doesn’t make it any less disappointing — especially for the tribes and environmental advocates who have repeatedly pushed for transparency and meaningful public review, only to be shut out time and again.

Allowing a handful of powerful voices to dictate land and water policy while sidelining the broader public is not the record one would expect from someone eyeing a run for president.

Billionaires, lobbyists and political insiders shouldn’t be the only ones with influence over California’s future. Whether it’s the Delta tunnel, the voluntary water agreements, or the rollout of California Forever, the public deserves a real voice in how the state’s land and water resources are managed.

Having a say in our own future isn’t a favor — it’s a right.

Original source: CalMatters

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But in California farm country, his comments about water are also getting top attention.

The Golden State grows three-quarters of the country’s fruits and nuts and more than a third of its vegetables, largely thanks to a complex network of dams and canals that funnel water to the state’s fertile Central Valley.

In recent years, farmers have faced more limits on how much water they can access from this network because of environmental concerns, as well as on how much groundwater they can pump after years of overuse and drought.

Now, farmers are hoping the second Trump administration will ensure more stable water flows to their fields from the federally managed Central Valley Project and a plan for future water supplies. Trump recently posted on his Truth Social platform a criticism of the “rerouting of MILLIONS OF GALLONS OF WATER A DAY FROM THE NORTH OUT INTO THE PACIFIC OCEAN, rather than using it, free of charge, for the towns, cities, & farms dotted all throughout California.”

“It is the number one issue,” said Jason Phillips, chief executive of the Friant Water Authority, which represents more than a dozen irrigation districts serving a large swath of the crop-rich valley. “You only need labor and you only need the products and the equipment and everything else to grow food if you have water.”

California relies on water supplies from the Central Valley Project and the state-run State Water Project. The federal project provides 5 million acre-feet of water to farms each year and 600,000 acre-feet to cities, as well as water to maintain water quality in the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta, which provides critical habitat to fish and wildlife.

During the prior Trump administration, government officials issued rules to allow for a greater flow of water to California farms.

The move was blasted by environmental groups. The Biden administration pushed back on those decisions and has been working on new rules aimed at balancing farming with protections for endangered wildlife such as the delta smelt, a tiny fish that is an indicator of the health of California’s waterways, and Chinook salmon.

In recent years, California farmers said federal water allocations have been more limited than they feel is necessary after two years of ample rain boosted the state’s reservoirs. The state previously grappled with a yearslong drought that in 2022 saw the driest January-to-March period in at least a century, with scientists saying weather whiplash will likely become more common as the planet warms.

That is a big concern of environmentalists and commercial fishermen, who want to see less water diverted to agriculture and more flowing to the delta. Salmon fishing has been banned off the California coast for the past two years because of dwindling stocks, and critics say Trump’s prior decisions moving water away from salmon-spawning areas are to blame.

“They delivered all the cold water behind Shasta Dam. It literally cooked the baby salmon before they were hatched,” said Barry Nelson, policy advisor to the Golden State Salmon Association, a nonprofit focused on restoring California salmon. “Math is a brutal master, and we’ve hit physical limits on the amount of water we can take from the Bay delta, and the sign of that is the collapse of the ecosystem.”

Democratic California Gov. Gavin Newsom, a long-time Trump critic, recently called on California lawmakers to gear up ahead of another Trump presidency to safeguard the state’s progressive policies.

Environmental advocates, however, contend Newsom has not done enough to improve the situation in the delta for fish and wildlife. During Trump’s prior administration, Newsom opposed his rules for water flows, filing a legal challenge, but since then put forth his own rules, which Jon Rosenfield, San Francisco Baykeeper’s science director, said “were never that much different.”

Competing demands on California’s water have led to numerous battles over who gets how much. Advocates for fishermen, environmental interests and farmers all say more must be done to shore up future water supplies. But what that looks like depends on who is asked, with proposed solutions spanning from more conservation to expanding water storage to technological upgrades.

Aubrey Bettencourt, who oversaw Department of Interior water policy during the prior Trump administration, said she would like to see the system updated to respond to swings in climate rather than setting water releases based on the calendar. One of the issues, she said, is not how much water you get but knowing how much water you will get.

“It makes it very hard to plan not just as a farmer but as a city manager,” she said. “I would expect an emphasis on restoring operational certainty.”

The incoming Trump administration has discussed a series of economic policies that could also affect agriculture, including tariffs that could wind up affecting some exports and push up input costs for growers, according to a recent Rabobank report.

But when it comes to water, many farmers in California are hopeful.

Daniel Errotabere, a third-generation farmer and previous Westlands Water District president whose family grows tomatoes, garlic and almonds, is among them. As California ramps up limits on groundwater pumping, it is even more important to ensure a stable flow of surface water to grow the food the country is counting on, he said. Farmers have had to fallow fields and often don’t plant as much as they could because of water uncertainty, he said.

“If electricity was delivered this way there’d be a revolt,” Errotabere said. “This is not any way to operate resources.”

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The decision is designed to protect California’s dwindling salmon populations after drought and water diversions left river flows too warm and sluggish for the state’s iconic Chinook salmon to thrive. 

Salmon abundance forecasts for the year “are just too low,” Marci Yaremko, the California Department of Fish and Wildlife’s appointee to the Pacific Fishery Management Council, said last week. “While the rainfall and the snowpacks have improved, the stocks and their habitats just need another year to recover.”

State and federal agencies are now expected to implement the closures for ocean fishing. Had the season not been in question again this year, recreational boats would likely already be fishing off the coast of California, while the commercial season typically runs from May through October. 

In addition, the California Fish and Game Commission will decide next month whether to cancel inland salmon fishing in California rivers this summer and fall.

The closure means that California restaurants and consumers will have to look elsewhere for salmon, in a major blow to an industry estimated in previous years to be worth roughly half a billion dollars. 

“It’s catastrophic,” said Tommy “TF” Graham, a commercial fisherman based in Bodega Bay who now drives a truck delivering frozen and farmed salmon and other fish. “It means another summer of being forced to do something you don’t want to do, instead of doing something you love.”

About 213,600 Sacramento River fall-run salmon — a mainstay of the fishery — are estimated to be swimming off the coast. Though that’s an improvement over last year, the forecast remains the second-lowest on record since the fishery was closed in 2008 and 2009, Yaremko told the Pacific fishery council.

The numbers this year, plus the fact that the forecasts for salmon returning to spawn are routinely overestimated, “add concern,” Yaremko said. 

Many in the fishing industry say they support the closure, but urged state and federal officials to do more to improve conditions in the rivers salmon rely on. Fishing advocates and environmentalists have lambasted Gov. Gavin Newsom’s administration for failing to prioritize water quality and flows to protect salmon in the vital Bay-Delta watershed.  

“Our fishing fleets and coastal communities can not be the only ones making sacrifices to save these fish,” said Sarah Bates, who owns a commercial fishing boat called the Bounty, berthed at Fisherman’s Wharf in San Francisco. “Water policy needs to take the health of our river ecosystems seriously.” 

The closure comes as the fishing industry still awaits disaster aid promised from last year’s salmon fishery closures, which state officials estimated to have cost about $45 million. The fishing industry says that’s a vast underestimate. 

“Some fishermen have already lost their businesses and many will in the coming months,” said RJ Waldron, who runs a charter fishing business out of the East Bay. Last year’s closure dried up his customers, and he put his sportfishing boat up for sale months ago. 

“My dream of being a charter boat owner is very much a nightmare now.”

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