Bay Crossings is indeed concerned about the potential for what could be California’s worst disaster, and sent our senior editor, professional engineer, Wes Starratt to the delta to take a look and interview those in charge. He came back with a story of a vast area dotted with sinking islands, surrounded by crumbling levees: the salty San Francisco Bay on the west, on the east and the north the Sacramento, San Joaquin and other rivers pouring fresh water into the delta from the melting snows of the Sierras, and on the south side, the giant pumping plants that deliver fresh water to the farms of the central valley, residents of Contra Costa, Santa Clara, Santa Barbara and much of the southern half of the state. Twenty three million people in all depend on their fresh water coming from those unstable levees!
Published: August, 2005
Bay Crossings is indeed concerned about the potential for what could be California’s worst disaster, and sent our senior editor, professional engineer, Wes Starratt to the delta to take a look and interview those in charge. He came back with a story of a vast area dotted with sinking islands, surrounded by crumbling levees: the salty San Francisco Bay on the west, on the east and the north the Sacramento, San Joaquin and other rivers pouring fresh water into the delta from the melting snows of the Sierras, and on the south side, the giant pumping plants that deliver fresh water to the farms of the central valley, residents of Contra Costa, Santa Clara, Santa Barbara and much of the southern half of the state. Twenty three million people in all depend on their fresh water coming from those unstable levees!
Wes talked with a gamut of engineers and bureaucrats from the numerous federal and state agencies concerned with the delta before finally being led to Professor Jeffery Mount of UC/Davis, a member of the Department of Water Resources’ Integrated Science Board, who concluded: There is a 60 percent chance that, within the next 50 years, there will be a catastrophic event in the delta, either a flood or an earthquake, that will lead to multiple levee failures and island flooding. Yet, all we have in place are emergency responses and a pittance of investment in maintaining the existing levees. The money that should be invested in the delta is going off to the Middle East. Mount added, The good news is that the Department of Water Resources (DWR) has begun a two-year intensive study of the problems of the delta and what the options are.
Curt Schmutte, DWR’s principal engineer, said, The solutions to the problems of the delta may require a great many things, including levee improvements, turning some of the islands into reservoirs and even abandoning some of the islands.
There is a lot of federal and state money that needs to go into securing the delta, but the state agencies can’t make decisions that are binding on federal agencies, and no agencies gives up its power to be a part of the Bay Delta Program. That means that the job of coordinating delta programs is like herding cats according to Keith Coolidge, the Communications Director of the California Bay Delta Authority.
We will continue to keep our readers informed on this and other important issues in our region, and hope that other publications will pick up and provide even wider distribution of our coverage.
