California Officials Debate Giant Reservoir Project

California may construct the largest reservoir it has built since the 1970s in a town outside Sacramento.

“Sites Reservoir, all $4.4 billion of it, represents an about-face in a state where drought has become the norm and water users are told to scrimp and save. Promoters of Sites say the reservoir would significantly enhance water supplies for the rice farms of the Sacramento Valley as well as the cities of Southern California. The fact that it would be built just outside tiny Maxwell, in a poor and often-overlooked area of the state, has become a point of fierce regional pride,” The Sacramento Bee reported.

The administration of Governor Jerry Brown supports the proposal. “Sites Reservoir would release water to the Sacramento River to improve Delta water quality for ecosystem functions,” according to a report from the California Water Resources Department describing the benefits of the plan.

Supporters of the proposal, such as Republican State Senator Jim Nielsen, say it prevents water from leaving the state’s supply. “Instead of the water going out to sea, the water will remain here,” Nielsen said, per the Bee. “That is a significant policy change.”

Nevertheless, the fate of the proposal still hangs in the balance.

“While the Sacramento Valley’s major farm-irrigation districts have pledged to fund much of the project, they’re also about to ask the state to pay up to half of the reservoir’s cost, via bond money supplied by voter-approved Proposition 1,” the Bee reported.

“Because the state is unlikely to approve the request in full, Sites’ backers are also courting investment dollars from a dozen water agencies outside the Sacramento Valley, including the powerful Metropolitan Water District of Southern California. For every dollar they contribute, these agencies would be entitled to a share of the water stored in Sites,” it continued.

“The Sites Reservoir project is one of several around the state that have been identified for potential funding under Proposition 1,” Capital Press reported. Proposition 1 is a measure approved by California voters two years ago enabling the state to issue $7.1 billion in new bonds for water projects. The measure devoted $2.7 billion to water storage.

Jim Watson, general manager of the Sites Authority, described deep support for the reservoir project.

“The number of agencies signed on to participate in the project has grown from 14 to 34, including from the San Francisco Bay area and San Joaquin Valley,” Capital Press reported, citing Watson.

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Image caption, per the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation: “Shasta Dam, in northern California, is considered ‘The Keystone to the Central Valley Project.’ Primarily a rain-fed reservoir, Shasta Lake is 90 percent rainfall and 10 percent snow melt. The areas average rainfall is 62 inches a year. The rain season usually runs from early November through May.”