I. RECOMMENDATION:
There is no staff recommendation as this is Information Only.
II. BACKGROUND:
III. DISCUSSION:
Current Status
We are currently approaching the end of the 2021-2022 water year. Water years begin on first day March of each year and end on the last day of February. That date for this year is set to be February 28th.
For 2021-22 we were allocated 3829 acre-feet of water. This represented a 38.29% allocation of our normal unconstrained 10,000 acre-feet. As of January 16th, we exceeded that allocation and are anticipating an overdraft of 300 acre-feet. As per our contract with the USBR, this overdraft is subtracted from our allotment the following year, 2022-23.
Requests for more water was submitted to USBR on January 12, 2022 to make us whole for the current water year, but to date we have not received a response to our letter.
Future Outlook
For the 2022-23 water year, we are not entirely sure what to expect, as the official rain year has yet to end. While the storms we saw at the end of 2021 were beneficial, many reservoirs are still below their historical average for the time of year and snow level is only at 58% of the total seasonal average.
Recent news released by the Department of Water Resources (DWR) has shown that they are able to provide a modest increase of to water allotments to their Central Valley Project contracts. The link can be found here (https://water.ca.gov/News/News-Releases/2022/Jan-21/December-Storms-Allow-for-Modest-Increase-in-Planned-State-Water-Project-Deliveries). While this is certainly better news than what was expected prior to the winter storms, it does little to clarify the position of the City of Coalinga since the City of Coalinga holds a contract with the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation (USBR),. It is not necessarily dependent on allocations given through the DWR. As stated above, no correspondence has been provided by USBR as to what we may expect going into the next water year. The only information that we can glean, is that they withdrew an application for Temporary Urgency Change Petition (TUCP) for February 1 through April 2022. This petition would have allowed them to keep more water in Shasta and release less to the Delta. In essence, both the State and Federal Government had more water than they anticipated.
It is anticipated that Public Health and Safety figures, in our case 2890 acre-feet, will be provided at minimum, and at this current state, we anticipate an allotment similar to or slightly greater than the 2021-22 water year but there are several factors that can lead to lower or higher allocations. This is why staff will continue to engage USBR and update the Council on a regular basis as decisions may have to be made very quickly as the situation develops.
Mitigation Recommendations
At this time, staff recommends maintaining one day per week watering until late April, and depending on discussions with USBR, loosening those restrictions to two days a week watering during the warmer months if it is determined that our allocation can handle the additional 1 day a week watering demand. It should be noted that these restrictions will only be effective if active enforcement is present and applied. Historical evidence has shown this to be adequate in meeting our goals.
IV. ALTERNATIVES:
V. FISCAL IMPACT:
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