Measure for parks, water set for ballot

Some Californians are frustrated that the bond issue does not include money for major new dams

By Mike Taugher
CONTRA COSTA TIMES
Wednesday, June 14, 2006

A mammoth $5.4 billion parks and water bond measure has qualified for the November ballot, becoming the latest in a series of record-breaking environmental spending measures to come before California voters in recent years.

The bond would pay for drinking water improvements, levee repairs, habitat acquisitions and other projects.

It will appear on a ballot that is already asking Californians to approve a whopping $37 billion package of infrastructure improvements -- an unprecedented array of bond measures, said Field Poll director Mark DiCamillo.

"With so many competing ones, we haven't seen this before," DiCamillo said. "I would suspect voters will pick and choose" some bond measures to pass and reject others.

The parks and water bond, which would require majority voter approval to pass, would distribute money to specific regions of the state and give grants to projects to be awarded competitively.

It has $108 million earmarked for San Francisco Bay, for example. And it includes $130 million to improve water quality in the Delta, a key source of drinking water for 23 million people and the sole source for 500,000 residents of the Contra Costa Water District.

"This is a well-balanced bond measure that, for the first time in many years, would focus on Delta water quality improvements for drinking water quality," said CCWD general manager Walter Bishop.

Although the measure is likely to receive support from environmental groups and, to a lesser extent, water agencies, others are frustrated at the lack of state funding for major new dams in any of the recent water bond measures and will likely oppose this one.

"California's water infrastructure was built 40 and 50 years ago. It was for a population of 10 (million) to 11 million," compared with the state's 37 million now, said Assemblyman Michael Villines, R-Fresno. "To go forward with a water bond that doesn't have a comprehensive fix I think is a mistake."

Each of the other four bond measures slated for November, which would pay for transportation, education, flood control and housing, was negotiated by lawmakers. But legislators failed to develop a water bond, largely because of disagreements about whether the bond should cover construction of new dams.

"That's the reason that everything blew up," said Villines.

Opponents of new reservoirs had little incentive to craft a legislative deal because environmental groups, led by the Nature Conservancy, the National Audubon Society and the Trust for Public Land, had already written the parks and water bond measure.

Still, the head of the state's largest association of water agencies said his organization is likely to support the bond issue despite the lack of funding for dam construction.

"It is not the bond we would write (but) I believe it is the bond we could support," said Steve Hall, director of the Association of California Water Agencies.

Supporters of the bond measure say that creating a funding source for open space, habitat and water quality protection is a part of investing in infrastructure. With California's population expected to grow by another 25 million people by 2040, the supporters say those investments are needed to ensure residents continue to have clean water, protection from floods and the ability to access unpolluted parks, beaches, rivers and other landscapes.

The apparent collapse of portions of the Delta's open-water ecosystem, along with degrading water quality and the implosion of a statewide program called CalFed to address Delta water problems, contributed to the push for a bond that specifically allocates money for improving the Delta, said a spokeswoman for the bond measure campaign, Fiona Hutton.

"All those things elevated the policy issues. It makes perfect sense that money goes for that," Hutton said.

Since 1996, Californians have approved a series of increasingly expensive parks and water bonds, culminating in 2002 with the $3.4 billion Proposition 50, a parks and water bond that bears similarities to the latest bond measure, which is called the Safe Drinking Water, Water Quality and Supply, Flood Control, River and Coastal Protection Bond Act.

Mike Taugher covers natural resources. Reach him at 925-943-8257 or mtaugher@cctimes.com.

BALLOT MEASURE

The proposed bond issue would allocate $5.4 billion for parks and water. Some highlights include:

• $240 million to improve drinking water quality

• $800 million for flood control, including $275 million for Delta levee improvements

• $540 million for cleanup and protection for coastlines, beaches and bays

• $400 million for state parks, and another $400 million for local and regional parks.

http://nl.newsbank.com/nl-search/we/Archives?p_action=doc&p_docid=11243025E30E74F0&p_docnum=1