In California and across the West, some people face persistent challenges in trying to gain access to safe, reliable and affordable water to meet their everyday needs. In some cases, people are left without water as wells run dry during drought or they have no access at all to running water – a troubling deficit when hand washing is touted as necessary to protect against the coronavirus pandemic. Communities of color are most often burdened by these challenges.

To keep you informed about water equity issues, the Water Education Foundation has created a special webpage that makes it easier to find news and information related to water equity. The water equity page includes a list of resources and background information where you can dig deeper into the topic, as well as a link to a special newsfeed where you can find the latest news articles on water equity written by Foundation staff and other organizations that are posted in our weekday Aquafornia news aggregate.

In addition, the Foundation has just published a handbook, in partnership with the Santa Ana Watershed Project Authority in Southern California and the California Department of Water Resources, examining challenges facing disadvantaged communities in California and highlighting efforts to engage with them to help solve their water needs. The handbook includes advice distilled from the experiences of those involved in engagement efforts, which water providers and the public can apply to their specific circumstances.

The Water Education Foundation has always highlighted issues of water equity in its programming and publications and helped to bring attention to the disparities over the years. But we wanted to build a special webpage devoted to water equity as an ongoing resource in the wake of George Floyd’s death and the subsequent demonstrations supporting Black Lives Matter. Those events underscored the importance of addressing inequities plaguing our society, including inequities associated with water.