California Governor Jerry Brown’s mad scheme to build twin tunnels to siphon Sacramento Delta water southward to the Central Valley and southern California just got poleaxed by a Superior Court judge who ruled the Delta Plan was invalid. The judge says the plan does not provide quantifiable targets for reducing use of Delta water, and instead only had vague “recommendations.” This is a huge victory for anti-tunnel organizations, but not yet the end of the war.
It is either barking mad or deliberately evasive to glibly say that shunting water around the Delta will not hurt the Delta. Yet that is precisely what tunnel advocates say. The tunnel will be extremely expensive and probably won’t send SoCal much extra water. Who benefits? Big labor and big construction, primarily.
“The court noted that there can be no plan unless it is consistent with the law,” Krieger said, “and the law clearly states that the plan must have clear, quantified, and enforceable targets. The fact that it doesn’t means there is no longer an extant plan. This is a major blow to Governor Brown’s wasteful and destructive plan to drain the Delta via the Twin Tunnels, and a huge victory for the ratepayers and environment of California.”
The ruling greatly complicates State plans to expedite approval and construction of the tunnels, a water conveyance megaproject that would disrupt the ecological stability of the Delta, displace the region’s family farmers, cost taxpayers up to $70 billion or more, and provide no additional water to Southern California.
Still, warns Krieger, the battle is by no means over, given that the Brown Administration will attempt to revise the plan to conform to the judge’s order.