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announcements about upcoming events, tours, new Western
Water articles on key water topics and more!
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Our one-year Water Leaders program
gets you out of the office and into the field – whether it’s
on one of our water tours to the
Delta or the lower Colorado River, or meeting with your assigned
mentor.
Mentors play an important role in the program as they conduct a
shadow day with class members and help to shape ideas for the
class project on a key water
topic. The project is turned into a report with policy
recommendations that is presented to the Water Education
Foundation’s Board of Directors toward the end of the year.
Members of our popular Water
Leaders program increase their knowledge of the state’s most
precious natural resource while creating fond memories spent
on water tours and at events with their classmates and
working on the team project.
The yearly class began at the Water Education Foundation in 1997.
Now, 20 years later we are hosting a Water Leaders reunion as
part of our 40th Anniversary
celebration Oct. 26 in Sacramento.
A few tickets are still available for our Nov. 1-2 San Joaquin River
Restoration Tour, a once-a-year educational opportunity to
see the program’s progress first-hand. The tour begins and ends
in Fresno with an overnight stay in Los Banos.
The Water Education Foundation opened its doors in 1977
when California was in the second year of a major drought, and it
quickly became a vital source of nonpartisan, in-depth
information about water resources in California and the West.
Over the years, the Foundation has provided a vast repertoire of
news, educational materials and programs designed to increase
awareness about water, including tours of key watersheds,
workshops, a quarterly magazine, Western Water, and
Project WET (Water Education for Teachers).
Applications are now being accepted for the 2018 William R.
Gianelli Water Leaders Class. The
one-year program fosters a deeper knowledge of water issues and
leadership skills.
Criteria for acceptance include a commitment to understanding
water issues and an interest in seeking leadership roles on
public boards and commissions, or key staff positions.
When the Water Education Foundation first produced
its iconic California water map in
1979, a side of beef donated by a rancher was raffled off at a
major water conference to help fund its creation. Today, the maps
are displayed at highway rest stops and offices up and down
the state.
The hot water topic back in 1982 was the Peripheral Canal.
When the Foundation first wrote about the proposal for
Western Water magazine, some 10,000 extra copies were
sold at 35 cents each.
Explore more than 100 miles of Central California’s longest river
while learning about one of the nation’s largest and costliest
river restorations. Our San Joaquin River
Restoration Tour on Nov. 1-2 will feature speakers from key
governmental agencies and stakeholder groups who will explain the
restoration program’s goals and progress.
The Sacramento and San Joaquin are the two major rivers in the
Central Valley that feed the Delta, the hub of
California’s water supply network.
Our last two water tours of 2017 will take in-depth looks at how
these rivers are managed and used for agriculture, cities and the
environment. You’ll see infrastructure, learn about efforts to
restore salmon runs and talk to people with expertise on these
rivers.
Each year, participants on the Northern California Water Tour
enjoy three days exploring the Sacramento Valley during the
temperate fall. Join us as we travel along the Sacramento and
Feather rivers through a scenic landscape and learn about
issues associated with storing and delivering the state’s water
supply.
In the Summer 2017 issue of Western Water, “Now Comes
the Hard Part: Building Sustainable Groundwater Management in
California,” Writer Gary Pitzer looks into the efforts of
agencies beginning the task of bringing their basins to a level
of sustainability in accordance with the Sustainable Groundwater
Management Act (SGMA). California’s landmark 2014 law aims to
repair the effects of decades of unmanaged groundwater pumping,
which have left some parts of the state in “critical” overdraft.
What is groundwater? Where does it occur in California? What is
an aquifer? What is overdraft? And how can groundwater be
managed? These are all important things to understand in a state
where 40 percent of the water supply comes from underground.
But what does an aquifer look like? And how is water extracted
for use on farms and in homes? Those questions are illustrated on
the Foundation’s beautiful California
Groundwater Map poster, which was updated and
re-designed earlier this year.
The Sierra Nevada mountains are dotted with orange and brown
patches of dead trees. The U.S. Forest Service estimates with
aerial surveys that more than 100 million trees have died in
California this decade, 62 million dying in 2016 alone.
What is groundwater? Where does it occur in California? What is
an aquifer? What is overdraft? And how can groundwater be
managed? These are all terms in the news as the state moves
forward with implementation of the landmark Sustainable
Groundwater Management Act (SGMA).
If you haven’t already heard, the Water Education Foundation is
turning 40 this year!
We are celebrating in style on Oct. 26 in Sacramento, with the
added bonus of a special reunion aimed at graduates of our Water
Leaders program, which is celebrating its own 20th birthday.
Registration is coming soon but you or your organization can
sponsor this special event now and secure seats at this limited
capacity event. The highest sponsorship level secures a full
table of 10 seats.
California’s 2017 fire season is underway, with several blazes
threatening land, property and lives across the state. The
impacts of a wildfire can linger long after the blaze has been
extinguished. Runoff from burned areas can carry ashes, dirt and
other debris into lakes and rivers, threatening wildlife and the
quality of drinking water. Our Headwaters Tour, September 13
and 14, will examine this and other water-related issues in our
forests.
In the newly released Summer 2017 edition of River Report, Writer Gary Pitzer
delves into the successes and challenges of the Colorado River
Pilot Conservation Program.
The program was launched in 2014 as a collective effort by the
federal government and major urban water suppliers to pay for
water-saving measures strictly designed to create “system water”
for the benefit of everyone.
You can keep up to date with events, tours and other comings and
goings of the Water Education Foundation through social media.
We use our Twitter account @WaterEdFdn to keep you
posted on our upcoming events and tours, and to list the top
water stories from our week-day news aggregate known
as Aquafornia. We also tweet and
retweet breaking water news throughout the day.
