Drought, Water Law, and the Origins of California's Central Valley Project

Drought, Water Law, and the Origins of California's Central Valley Project PDF Author: Tim Stroshane
Publisher: University of Nevada Press
ISBN: 087417001X
Category : Nature
Languages : en
Pages : 429

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Book Description
This book is an account of how water rights were designed as a key part of the state’s largest public water system, the Central Valley Project. Along sixty miles of the San Joaquin River, from Gustine to Mendota, four corporate entities called “exchange contractors” retain paramount water rights to the river. Their rights descend from the days of the Miller & Lux Cattle Company, which amassed an empire of land and water from the 1850s through the 1920s and protected these assets through business deals and prolific litigation. Miller & Lux’s dominance of the river relied on what many in the San Joaquin Valley regarded as wasteful irrigation practices and unreasonable water usage. Economic and political power in California’s present water system was born of this monopoly on water control. Stroshane tells how drought and legal conflict shaped statewide economic development and how the grand bargain of a San Joaquin River water exchange was struck from this monopoly legacy, setting the stage for future water wars. His analysis will appeal to readers interested in environmental studies and public policy.

Drought, Water Law, and the Origins of California's Central Valley Project

Drought, Water Law, and the Origins of California's Central Valley Project PDF Author: Tim Stroshane
Publisher: University of Nevada Press
ISBN: 087417001X
Category : Nature
Languages : en
Pages : 429

Get Book

Book Description
This book is an account of how water rights were designed as a key part of the state’s largest public water system, the Central Valley Project. Along sixty miles of the San Joaquin River, from Gustine to Mendota, four corporate entities called “exchange contractors” retain paramount water rights to the river. Their rights descend from the days of the Miller & Lux Cattle Company, which amassed an empire of land and water from the 1850s through the 1920s and protected these assets through business deals and prolific litigation. Miller & Lux’s dominance of the river relied on what many in the San Joaquin Valley regarded as wasteful irrigation practices and unreasonable water usage. Economic and political power in California’s present water system was born of this monopoly on water control. Stroshane tells how drought and legal conflict shaped statewide economic development and how the grand bargain of a San Joaquin River water exchange was struck from this monopoly legacy, setting the stage for future water wars. His analysis will appeal to readers interested in environmental studies and public policy.

California Drought

California Drought PDF Author: Betsy A. Cody
Publisher: DIANE Publishing
ISBN: 1437927572
Category : Technology & Engineering
Languages : en
Pages : 31

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Book Description
California experienced severe water supply shortages in 2009, which led to economic disruption across the state, incl. losses in agricultural areas in the western portion of the Central Valley ¿ areas already experiencing declines in the housing industry and the economic downturn in general. At the same time, several fish species whose habitat lie at the heart of California¿s water supply system and throughout its northern rivers are in decline and some face the possibility of extinction. This situation too has had economic implications, resulting in job and income losses in northern California. Contents of this report: (1) Intro.; (2) What is Drought?; (3) Drought in California; (4) Regulatory Restrictions Affecting Water Deliveries; (5) California Water Rights. Illus.

History of Legislation and Policy Formation of the Central Valley Project

History of Legislation and Policy Formation of the Central Valley Project PDF Author: Mary Montgomery
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 294

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Book Description


Central Valley Project

Central Valley Project PDF Author: United States. Congress. House. Committee on Interior and Insular Affairs
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 434

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Managing California's Water

Managing California's Water PDF Author: Ellen Hanak
Publisher: Public Policy Instit. of CA
ISBN: 1582131414
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 500

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Book Description


California Water Transfer Law and Suggestions for Improvement

California Water Transfer Law and Suggestions for Improvement PDF Author: Margaret Irish
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 148

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The Great Thirst

The Great Thirst PDF Author: Norris Hundley Jr.
Publisher: Univ of California Press
ISBN: 9780520925298
Category : Nature
Languages : en
Pages : 830

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Book Description
The story of "the great thirst" is brought up to date in this revised edition of Norris Hundley's outstanding history, with additional photographs and incisive descriptions of the major water-policy issues facing California now: accelerating urbanization of farmland and open spaces, persisting despoliation of water supplies, and demands for equity in water allocation for an exploding population. People the world over confront these problems, and Hundley examines them with clarity and eloquence in the unruly laboratory of California. The obsession with water has shaped California to a remarkable extent, literally as well as politically and culturally. Hundley tells how aboriginal Americans and then early Spanish and Mexican immigrants contrived to use and share the available water and how American settlers, arriving in ever-increasing numbers after the Gold Rush, transformed California into the home of the nation's preeminent water seekers. The desire to use, profit from, manipulate, and control water drives the people and events in this fascinating narrative until, by the end of the twentieth century, a large, colorful cast of characters and communities has wheeled and dealed, built, diverted, and connived its way to an entirely different statewide waterscape.

Competition for California Water

Competition for California Water PDF Author: Ernest A. Engelbert
Publisher: Univ of California Press
ISBN: 0520309898
Category : Nature
Languages : en
Pages : 222

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Book Description
California’s water is at the center of an intense economic and political struggle. A balance between supply and demand must be reached, but it is far from certain that all Californians will get as much water as they want at a price they feel is right. Competition for California Water presents essential information on key issues, including: Costs: What would be the yields and what would be the costs, in dollars as well as less tangible values, of developing new sources of water? Cost-sharing: How much of the cost of water development and distribution should be borne by the general public, and how much by water users and other beneficiaries? Environmental protection: To what extent should environmental values be protected? Conservation: To what extent can the need for new water development be offset by conservation and more efficient use of water? Institutional reform: Can changes in the laws and institutions of California produce a more efficient system of water supply and management? Agriculture: How much increase in cost and/or loss of water can California agriculture bear and still remain competitive? Thirty-one experts on all aspects of this topic project alternative futures for California’s water supply. Written in nontechnical language, Competition for California Water is an invaluable source of information for Californians concerned with the future of their state. This title is part of UC Press's Voices Revived program, which commemorates University of California Press’s mission to seek out and cultivate the brightest minds and give them voice, reach, and impact. Drawing on a backlist dating to 1893, Voices Revived makes high-quality, peer-reviewed scholarship accessible once again using print-on-demand technology. This title was originally published in 1982.

The Dreamt Land

The Dreamt Land PDF Author: Mark Arax
Publisher: Vintage
ISBN: 1101910194
Category : Nature
Languages : en
Pages : 578

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Book Description
A vivid, searching journey into California's capture of water and soil—the epic story of a people's defiance of nature and the wonders, and ruin, it has wrought Mark Arax is from a family of Central Valley farmers, a writer with deep ties to the land who has watched the battles over water intensify even as California lurches from drought to flood and back again. In The Dreamt Land, he travels the state to explore the one-of-a-kind distribution system, built in the 1940s, '50s and '60s, that is straining to keep up with California's relentless growth. The Dreamt Land weaves reportage, history and memoir to confront the "Golden State" myth in riveting fashion. No other chronicler of the West has so deeply delved into the empires of agriculture that drink so much of the water. The nation's biggest farmers—the nut king, grape king and citrus queen—tell their story here for the first time. Arax, the native son, is persistent and tough as he treks from desert to delta, mountain to valley. What he finds is hard earned, awe-inspiring, tragic and revelatory. In the end, his compassion for the land becomes an elegy to the dream that created California and now threatens to undo it.

Central Valley Project, California. Water Rights, Supplies, and Uses

Central Valley Project, California. Water Rights, Supplies, and Uses PDF Author: United States. Congress. House. Committee on Interior and Insular Affairs. Special Subcommittee on Irrigation and Reclamation
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Water resources development
Languages : en
Pages : 424

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Book Description
Committee Serial No. 13.