El Dorado Water NEWStream
November Edition
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A Word From Our Board Chair, Brian Veerkamp
As a former fire chief, I’ve known for years that mitigating wildfire risks through forest management and plentiful, affordable water for green belts and landscape is essential to the health and safety of the environment and our communities! And, as an Agency board member for the past eight years, it has been my goal to make sure others know that effective water planning is also a critical tool in the fight against wildfires, and their impacts.
Responsible drought planning goes beyond just ensuring there’s enough water available during a drought to maintain our way of life. It must also address numerous long-term challenges that occur during or after droughts. Managing floods and mudslides in burn-scarred areas, safeguarding healthy ecosystems, and maintaining fire-resilient forests are integral to strategies like stormwater capture and reuse, forest conservation, water quality monitoring, and infrastructure protection projects.
These projects are the future of water and drought resiliency, and water planning, which must also focus on where water comes from, and where it ends up. Most important, a broad regional approach to water planning, cost- and data-sharing, and collaboration to streamline and synergize efforts are key components to the future success of water and drought planning and resilience.
The growing severity of wildfires serves as a stark reminder that the state is experiencing changes where we must adapt or face new and increased risks. The Agency and our partners see the need for these adaptations and collaborations, seeking how best to address new challenges with creative, thoughtful, and data-driven water management strategies, which will hopefully lead to a safer and more environmentally feasible future for all of us.
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El Dorado County Fairgrounds Stormwater Project
Moving Forward
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As outlined in our 2019 Water Resources Development and Management Plan, we recognize that stormwater as a resource is a critical element to achieving our mission. As part of our stormwater resource initiative, we are partnering with the City of Placerville, El Dorado County, El Dorado County Fair Association, and El Dorado Resource Conservation District, in an effort to implement water quality improvements at the El Dorado County Fairgrounds, located in Placerville.
The project will add new infrastructure and technology to capture and use stormwater on site, treat impervious runoff, increase groundwater infiltration, enhance drainage, reduce the occurrence of erosion and runoff, and prevent non-point source pollution. Additionally, a rooftop rainwater capture system will supply non-potable water for landscaping, grass swales will be added near the roads for stormwater conveyance to treat and percolate runoff into the ground, grass filter strips will be added to treat surface flow from paved areas, and new ditches will divert stormwater runoff to the swales and grass filter strips.
This project will demonstrate to the community the technology that can be used to treat, capture, and reuse stormwater runoff. Low-impact development approaches are also being applied to the project, which is scheduled for completion in 2021.
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Agency Assisting with Tahoe Basin Water Rights Process |
In December 2015, the Federal Water Master for the Truckee River began implementing the historic Truckee River Operating Agreement (TROA), which was executed in 2008. The TROA settled decades of numerous lawsuits among many water rights holders, managers, and others responsible for water management within the Truckee River watershed in California and Nevada. The agreement allocated 90 percent of the water to Nevada, while still retaining the water rights of all users of the Truckee River, including the Tahoe City Public Utility District (TCPUD) and South Tahoe Public Utility District (STPUD).
The TROA requires substantially different operations of the Truckee River system, including maintaining more water in upstream reservoirs. As a result, the California State Water Resources Control Board (SWRCB) concluded in 2018 that the changed conditions from execution of the TROA affect pending water rights petitions and applications, and therefore require TCPUD and STPUD to submit updated water rights petition and application materials. With this new SWRCB requirement, TCPUD and STPUD, along with others, have completed a joint effort to develop a common approach to calculating future water production requirements and water availability analyses on the California side of the Lake Tahoe Basin. This effort was initiated to support each agency’s actions necessary to secure and protect their respective existing surface water rights and their applications for new surface water rights.
Earlier this year, our Board of Directors approved funding support for TCPUD and STPUD, to assist with legal, technical, and other direct costs associated with the joint California Tahoe Basin efforts to support finalizing pending petitions and applications with the SWRCB and secure the purveyors’ surface water rights. With over 1,200 El Dorado County residents in TCPUD’s service area, the Agency is directly funding about $26,000 of this fiscal year’s costs for TCPUD’s work on the water rights process.
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For the past two years, TCPUD has been working collaboratively with STPUD and others in the California Tahoe Basin to prepare a comprehensive water production and demand analysis. This joint effort, while requiring more up-front coordination, will simplify pending water petitions and applications within the Tahoe Basin by resolving technical and operational uncertainties and making the process with the SWRCB shorter and much less costly.
- Sean Barclay, General Manager, Tahoe City Public Utility District
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Agency Continues Support of Watershed Management
Initiatives in the Region
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In keeping with the Agency’s broad authorities, our Watershed Management Program concentrates on actions that meaningfully contribute to long-term water supply reliability and water quality protection for El Dorado County, such as headwaters management, water quality management for rural and agricultural communities, and habitat and other ecosystem function enhancement.
Current initiatives that we support include the American River Basin Study (ARBS), which seeks to better integrate the management of snowpack ‘reservoir’ conditions with upper and lower American River Basin water storage operations. The ARBS is a collaboration among several agencies to evaluate current and future water needs and improve regional water supply reliability and flexibility. Key partners are local water purveyors and planning agencies, the U.S. Forest Service, the Bureau of Land Management, and others. Additionally, the Regional Drought Contingency Plan that is under development for the Upper American River Basin will also consider approaches to coordinated management of the headwaters of the Sierra Nevada with downstream water project operations.
These and other ongoing projects will also involve coordination with lower American River operations to improve the water management efficiency of the regional watershed, and will increase collaboration with several of our more regionally concerned partners, including the Association of California Water Agencies and Regional Water Authority.
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Agency Hosted Inaugural Countywide Plenary for Water |
On October 8, we hosted the inaugural Countywide Plenary for Water, a convening of water stakeholders and thought leaders to focus on partnerships and collaboration on water resources development and management for El Dorado County. Plenary participants included representatives from water utilities, local government, businesses, and community organizations from throughout the County. We would like to thank all of the participants for their time and thoughtful input, with a special thank you to our panelists: Ansel Lundberg, Originator, Energy Trading & Contracts, Sacramento Municipal Utility District; Matt Jedra, Acting Deputy Forest Supervisor, U.S. Forest Service; and Mike Miller, Partner, The Ferguson Group.
The meeting included a facilitated panel and follow-up discussion around a variety of topics related to water resources planning for the County, including emerging state and federal policies that may affect the County, and opportunities for technical assistance, continued collaboration, innovation, and implementation within each County area that will promote the goals of our 2019 Water Resources Development and Management Plan.
The next Plenary convening is scheduled for March 2021.
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