Program would reimburse owners for maintenance

By WES SANDER
Capital Press

SACRAMENTO -- A bill by Sen. Lois Wolk, D-Davis, to extend the state's cost-share agreement for Delta levee repairs has passed an Assembly committee on a fast track through the legislature.

The bill has received only unanimous votes in the Senate, and did so again in the Assembly Water, Parks and Wildlife committee.

The cost-share program was created in 1973 to help maintain levees in the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta. It reimburses local agencies for up to 75 percent of the costs exceeding $1,000 per mile of any effort to maintain or improve levees. The proportion hinges on the local agency's ability to pay.

Without Wolk's bill, the program's subventions will shrink to 50 percent of costs on July 1.

The Delta's approximately 1,100 miles of levees are largely private, but much of the state relies on them to preserve water supplies. Many of the levees are seen as fragile, and experts predict an earthquake could rupture them and flood the man-made islands they protect.

This would draw in seawater and turn the Delta salty, cutting off the water supply to millions of users in the San Joaquin Valley and Southern California.

Wolk says preserving the program is essential while the Delta Stewardship Council, created by last year's historic package of water bills, formulates a management plan for the estuary.

"In the near term, Delta levees will continue to be the sole tool for water conveyance" for the State Water Project and federal Central Valley Project, Wolk told the Assembly committee. "If the formula returns to a 50-50 split, then the many small districts with a limited economic base would not be able to afford to maintain the Delta levees adequately."

The bill is supported by the Association of California Water Agencies, California Partnership for the San Joaquin Valley, Regional Council of Rural Counties and Valley Ag Water Coalition.

It now goes to the Assembly Appropriations committee.