Flow Restoration Initiative
There is not enough water reliably available in California to continue to meet existing demand. California water users have been promised five times more water than exists.
The overallocation of the state’s water resources has deprived the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta (Delta) and its tributaries of so much flow that it has decimated its ecosystem and threatened the survival of native fish.
This has led to six native fish species, including two runs of Central Valley Chinook salmon, to be listed as endangered. California’s white sturgeon are also a candidate for listing under state and federal endangered species acts.
The State Water Resources Control Board (State Board) must make a concerted effort to evaluate the demands, uses, hydrology, and operation of each watershed in the state. It must set clear and enforceable rules for each watershed in detail, not just approximate them. It must set operating rules for the Delta that turn inflow into outflow. It must also set rules for upstream diversions and reservoir storage.
The State Board must establish a water budget that California can afford.
California Sportfishing Protection Alliance (CSPA) vigorously participates in every opportunity to steer California’s water policy in a direction that is protective of rivers, the Delta, and the fish and wildlife that depend on them.
CSPA is currently campaigning as part of its Flow Restoration Initiative to reform water rights, plan for drought, enforce the Reasonable Use Doctrine and the Public Trust Doctrine, and to stop Sites Reservoir which would divert even more flows away from the Sacramento River and the Delta.
Flow Restoration Campaigns
Recent News
Flow Restoration Initiative
On October 2nd, 2024, CSPA’s Chris Shutes delivered testimony before the Administrative Hearings Office (AHO) of the State Water Resources Control Board (State Water Board). Chris’s testimony disputed the talking points of the Sites Project Authority that the proposed Sites Reservoir would divert water only during periods of high flow in the Sacramento River. It […]
In the never-ending saga of calling a skunk an adorable striped kitten, the proponents of the Voluntary Agreements released, on August 16, 2024, their latest defense of the scheme to undermine the flows needed for San Francisco Bay and the Delta to once again thrive. A flood of water agencies, headed by the California Department […]
On July 30, 2024, California Sportfishing Protection Alliance (CSPA) and The Center for Biological Diversity (The Center) submitted public scoping comments on Water Rights Application 29835 (Application 29835) and the associated Mokelumne River Conjunctive Use Program (MICUP). Public scoping comments are intended to inform project leaders on what should be included in the Environmental Impact […]
PRESS RELEASE Court gives Sites Reservoir green light to degrade the environment SACRAMENTO, CA – This week, a coalition of conservation groups, including Friends of the River (FOR), California Sportfishing Protection Alliance (CSPA), Center for Biological Diversity, California Water Impact Network, and Save California Salmon (plaintiffs) received a ruling on their challenge to the proposed Sites […]
On April 2, 2024, Governor Gavin Newsom announced the release of the 2023 update of the California Water Plan (Water Plan). Governor Newsom announced the Water Plan at a press conference held at Phillips Station in the high Sierra, just after this year’s snowpack was measured there at 113 percent of average. At the press […]
