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Passage of the landmark Sustainable Groundwater Management Act
has put an unseen resource into public view as regions throughout
the state undertake the next step – implementation. During
our Groundwater Tour,
you will learn what actions water leaders in the Sacramento,
Yolo, Solano and Napa regions are taking to monitor and manage
this valuable resource during this critical drought and into the
future.
Check out the full draft itinerary
here. Experts from USGS, UC Davis, DWR and regional
agencies will discuss groundwater pollution, the surface
water-groundwater connection and the important role of
groundwater for city supplies and for agriculture – including
vineyards, dairies and more .
Join us as we venture into Inland Southern California, a major
hub of the region’s water operations where both the Colorado
River Aqueduct and the State Water Project bring imported water.
But while much of the region depends on imported supplies, it is
also blessed with ample groundwater and has strived in many cases
to make every drop count through water recycling and other
innovative means. Learn about this on our Southern California
Tour, as we travel from Ontario to the Temecula wine country
to see how the region has sought to implement drought-proofing
measures.
Groundwater overdraft, the Sustainable Groundwater Management Act
and groundwater’s importance during a drought are all headline
issues across California that will be discussed on
our upcoming Groundwater Tour.
As we travel from the Sacramento region to the Napa wine country,
we will discuss aquifer recharge, storage and water
recycling, well drilling, groundwater use for
agricultural, municipal and industrial uses and groundwater
contamination in disadvantaged communities.
Join us October 8-9 for a two-day, one-night tour of Inland
Southern California to see how the region has become a leader in
managing groundwater, recycling water and promoting
drought-tolerant landscapes.
We’ll also visit Diamond Valley Lake, the large reservoir
operated by Metropolitan Water District, the Temecula wine
country, wetlands along the Santa Ana River and Riverside County
Flood Control and Water Conservation District’s low-impact
development facility, which shows ways to build water-wise
features.
As drought and groundwater issues continue to dominate headlines,
gain a deeper understanding of the key issues associated with the
life-sustaining resource at our popular Water 101 Workshop.
Leading policymakers and experts will serve as the
teachers of this 1-1/2 day workshop on Feb. 4-5 at
the West Sacramento City Hall.
California’s worst drought on record is a hot topic of
conversation but most people only have second-hand information
about its real impacts.
The Water Education Foundation’s Drought Tour on September 1 & 2
gives you the chance to personally interact with real people
facing real problems in one of the state’s hardest-hit areas.
Join us for our California Drought Tour through the San Joaquin
Valley on September 1-2. Buy
your seat on the bus today! Early bird prices good until
August 3.
As farmers fallow fields, towns receive emergency drinking water
and groundwater supplies are depleted, we will explore the
impacts of California’s unprecedented four-year drought on the
nation’s breadbasket and what steps are being taken to avert
disaster.
Hear firsthand from farmers, water managers, state and local
officials, researchers, and community activists.
Join us this September for a two-day tour of the San Joaquin
Valley to explore the impacts of California’s unprecedented,
four-year drought on the nation’s breadbasket and what steps are
being taken to avert disaster.
As farmers fallow fields, towns receive emergency drinking water
and groundwater supplies are depleted, we will get an
up-close view of one of the state’s hardest-hit regions. The
Sept. 1-2 tour starts and ends in Fresno.
Besides our upcoming drought tour, we’ll be hosting a groundwater
tour and a Southern California tour this fall.
Rounding out our 2015 tours will be our annual Northern
California Tour and the San Joaquin River Restoration Tour. To
find more information on all tours and to register,
click here. Buy a ticket and
grab a seat on the bus with us!
Our exciting fall tour lineup includes in-depth looks
at groundwater in the Sacramento region and drought-proofing
measures in Southern California along with our annual Northern
California and San Joaquin River Restoration tours.
Early-bird prices are still available for each tour. Click
here to see the tour line-up. There,
you can get more information on each tour and register securely
online.
Our 2016 calendar is starting to fill up with exciting events. We
are organizing an International Groundwater
Conference in San Francisco next June 28-30.
This international conference focusing on the nexus between
groundwater and agriculture will provide scientists,
policymakers, agricultural and environmental stakeholders,
government officials and consultants with the latest scientific,
management, legal and policy advances for sustaining groundwater
resources in agricultural regions around the world.
In the May/June issue of Western Water magazine, Writer Gary
Pitzer explores the challenges and possible future of the Salton
Sea in this edition.
The Salton Sea, the shallow, briny inland lake at the
southeastern edge of California, is slowly evaporating and
becoming more saline. By the end of 2017, the state-mandated
obligation for Imperial Irrigation District to provide mitigation
water to the sea will end. Without that water, the sea will
diminish faster, exposing more playa at a faster rate.
Join us for our annual Bay-Delta Tour from June 24th –
26th for a rare opportunity to visit the heart of California’s
water supply, see infrastructure vital to managing water in the
state and speak to the experts who operate the projects. You will
also learn from key stakeholders representing a broad diversity
of specialties including farming, ecology, history and land
management.
Attend the May 21-22
Integrated Regional Water Management conference for a sneak
preview of recommended strategies from the Department of Water
Resources for the future of IRWM in California, based on more
than two years of interaction with IRWM practitioners and other
stakeholders.
Headline issues related to drought, mandatory conservation and
groundwater management also are on the agenda, which
features a top lineup of speakers, including keynote speaker Fran
Spivy-Weber, vice chair of the California State Water Resources
Control Board.
How do you get multiple agencies with multiple missions on the
same page when it comes to water? The importance of governmental
alignment will be discussed by a panel of top policymakers at the
Integrated Regional Water Management 2.0: The Next Generation
conference in San Diego.
Speakers on this panel are:
Col. Mike Farrell, Commander, Sacramento
District, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers
Gary Bardini, Deputy Director for Integrated
Water Management, California Department of Water Resources
Gordon Burns, Undersecretary, California
Environmental Protection Agency
Dennis Grossman, Senior Advisor for
Environmental Science and Policy, California Strategic Growth
Council
Norma Camacho, Chief Operating Officer:
Watersheds, Santa Clara Valley Water District
David Bolland, Special Projects Manager,
Association of California Water Agencies
Join us on our next tour June 24-26 as we visit the Bay-Delta,
the heart of the state’s water system and the center of the water
political debate. Early bird prices are available until
May 24.
Gov. Jerry Brown, during a luncheon speech last week at the
Association of California Water Agencies conference in
Sacramento, told critics to “shut-up” if they hadn’t spent
millions of hours studying the proposed plan to install two
tunnels to divert water around the Delta to the south.
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 the top water
stories from our week-day news aggregate known as Aquafornia. We also tweet and retweet breaking
news throughout the day.
The drought, groundwater management, coordinating governmental
agencies, and Integrated Regional Water Management will be the
focus of a May 21-22 conference in San Diego. Topics on
the draft agenda include:
Making IRWM Even Stronger
Integrating Groundwater Sustainability Planning and IRWM
Finding Funding: Keeping IRWM Alive
Multiple Agencies, Multiple Missions: The Importance of
Governmental Alignment
With so much attention focused on California’s drought, water
use and agriculture, join the Water Education Foundation’s
Central Valley Tour to get an up-close view of the issues.
The Central Valley, often dubbed the nation’s breadbasket, is at
the heart of our three-day tour beginning April 22. The
tour also offers participants a chance to learn about
groundwater, subsidence and habitat restoration as it weaves
through key sites belonging to the State Water Project and the
Central Valley Project, the state’s two major water delivery
systems.
