Prop 3 is a boondoggle. Press Democrat is one of the few papers in the state that supports this prop. The wine industry over pumps here which has created 3 medium water basins in the GSA to now become 5 basins with 3 high priority due to years of over pumping for the vineyards. Taxpayers will subsidize their profits. Very little actually goes to environment. VOTE NO.
The Sierra Club is one of the groups opposing. The LA Times calls it "pure pork". Here are some of the valid points made by them.
Prop 3 would:
● Shifting the cost for water from the end users to California taxpayers;
● Reducing state money available for other critical state programs like education, affordable housing, and healthcare;
● Failing to provide for adequate project oversight and financial accountability.
There are at least five specific ways that we (Sierra Club) believe this bond will directly harm the environment.
- It could open new funding pathways for ill-conceived dams. Only chapters 8 and 9 and the new Section 6 (page 49-50) prohibits the expenditure of funds on new surface storage or raising existing reservoirs. We are concerned that the only clear prohibition is found in 3 specific places in the bond and nowhere else. This raises the issue that the other chapters are not subject to that prohibition. Also, the bond measure’s proponents rejected requests by environmental groups to overtly prohibit funds from being used to construct, expand or improve conveyance facilities associated with any surface storage project listed in the CalFed decision of 2000. We take this as a sign that it is possible—and maybe probable—that funds in this bond will be used to advance several dam projects we have opposed.
- It could create incentives that harm threatened and endangered species. Section 86032 of the bond provides funding for agricultural water conservation in the tributaries of the Delta for the benefit of flow and to expedite water transfers. This section does not explicitly prohibit the expenditure of funds on activities that create adverse impacts to wildlife, such as eliminating flooding of rice fields for decomposition or the disking of fallowed agricultural lands to prevent the growth of plants that provide for upland habitat for birds and other species. This section could provide perverse incentives that decrease migratory bird habitat and habitat for other wildlife such as the threatened giant garter snake.
- It shifts money away from important upland habitat conservation. The bond’s proposed addition of Section 2799.7 to the Fish and Game Code would send the Habitat Conservation Fund money to water acquisition after 2020. We do not believe that 100 percent of that money should go only to acquire water. That fund has been important to non-water related habitat. If there is to be a reallocation of that fund, a substantial percentage should go to wildlife corridor conservation in the face of climate change.
- It raids the Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund (GGRF) to build political support. AB 32 (2006) created California’s cap and trade system. Emitters of greenhouse gases must either reduce their levels of emissions or purchase credits to cover their emissions at auction. Proceeds from those auctions are supposed to go towards projects that reduce greenhouse gas emissions. This bond mandates that funds paid into the GGRF by the Department of Water Resources, Metropolitan Water District of Southern California, San Luis and Delta Mendota Water Authority will be given back to those agencies for water conservation measures. This could shift a large amount of money from programs that efficiently cut