Letters to the Editor
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Plenty of water in the West, but more politics than anything
Each and every time we have a dry year, the prognosticators in California are sure it will last, and it never does. Our source of water has been consistently ample, the snowpack in the Sierras, and the Colorado River. The problem in California is that the agricultural interests get first interest, and they sell what they don't need to the coastal municipal districts. This also creates a sitution in which the central part of California, where most of the growing is done, is technically water wealthy. That encourages urban sprawl.
Claims that California is going to dry up and blow away are false. The decimated Owens Valley is coming back, after LA stole their water nearly a hundred years ago, and Mono Lake is returning to life. Of course one of the secrets of water management is that each time a new subdivision goes in one of these areas, prime farmland is covered over. Agriculture uses more water than the homes which replace it. The secret to making it all work, is fruits and vegetables imported from foreign countries, but how long can that last? Meanwhile it's a cheap way of getting their water...