On summer weekends, the Truckee River is a favorite spot for vacationers, rafters, bike riders and patient anglers chasing the elusive trout plying its fresh,
As Californians, we’re all keenly aware of the “big one” that’s looming. I would imagine that most people consider the potential impacts of an earthquake
There are always two sides of a coin. Southern California has been gripped by powerful and fierce storms this year that have wrecked havoc and caused extensive damage in some communities. Images of uprooted trees, flooded streets and homes, overflowing storm drains, and terrifying mudslides have dominated television and newspaper coverage. Drought warnings, mandatory water conservation and rationing may be distant memories to many who reside in the coastal plains from Ventura County to San Diego, but we should not rest easy. While we’ve experienced record-breaking levels of rainfall and snowpack in 2011, much of that water can’t be physically captured. And that situation brings me to the other side of the coin. That surplus water, angrily raging through concrete river channels and dumping out into the Pacific Ocean, presents a significant and unique opportunity for Southern California to improve its water supplies and rise to new standards of environmental stewardship. The challenge: Capture that stormwater now, bank it and save it for a future dry day.
Californians have demonstrated a strong commitment to the environmental mantra, “reduce, reuse, recycle.” That same principle needs to be applied aggressively to making more efficient use of our finite water supplies. In this arid state, every drop counts.