Newsom’s stealthy divide and conquer Delta tunnel campaign

OPINION – Gavin Newsom’s stealthy divide and conquer tactics are pushing marginalized communities against each other in a war over water. Newsom, his administration and State Water Contractors are appropriating environmental justice language to sway public opinion in Southern California about the Delta Conveyance Project – also referred to as the Delta tunnel. They argue that the Delta tunnel is essential for Southern California’s disadvantaged communities, yet misrepresent the harm the project continues to have on the tribal communities along California’s major rivers and on communities in the Delta watershed.

Pitting disadvantaged communities from different regions of the state against each other is a cynical strategy, and is all the more egregious when considering it’s done in the interest of serving only one sector of California’s economy that these players have deemed all-important – special interests in Southern California and portions of Silicon Valley. In this “Hunger Games” narrative for California water management, the areas with water resources will be sacrificed for the benefit of those with privilege, wealth, and power.

Stockton, the largest Delta city, spent $300M over the last dozen years on a Delta drinking water system that returns two gallons of clean treated wastewater to the Delta for every gallon taken upstream. Despite this, Wade Crowfoot, California’s Secretary of Natural Resources, has gone on the record saying that Newsom’s proposed tunnel would help communities of color in Stockton by protecting their drinking water. The opposite will happen if the tunnel diverts more water out of this ecosystem.

Crowfoot’s twisting of facts reveals that the Newsom Administration has no interest in building water equity for all Californians, but rather seeks to create the illusion that they seek to protect environmental justice communities.

The facts tell a different story.

Last March, the US. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) said that the proposed construction of the tunnel “could have potential adverse effects” for Delta communities already struggling with decades of economic disinvestment and environmental burdens, in part, from the over-extraction of water. Approximately one-third of Stockton live at the bottom 80-99 percentile for environmental health indicators. And the entire Delta region is a disadvantaged economic region according to a recent analysis completed by the Department of Water Resources.

Decimated salmon runs, wildlife, and native plant species essential to tribal culture are disappearing. In turn, communities of color living along the Delta are left with extreme water pollution that contributes to toxic algal blooms causing respiratory disease that renders waterways dangerous for recreation.

We need to restore the Delta and stop the tunnel to eliminate these negative environmental impacts on local communities. The Delta Tribal Environmental Coalition, comprised of the Shingle Springs Band of Miwok Indians, the Winnemem Wintu Tribe, Buena Vista Rancheria, Restore the Delta, and Little Manila Rising, has filed a Title VI Civil Rights complaint against the State Water Resources Control Board that is under investigation by U.S. EPA. The complaint outlines the disparate impacts on tribes and disadvantaged communities caused by the state’s failure to regulate the Delta watershed for the benefit of all people and beneficial uses.

The Delta is under threat to lose its levee subvention funding in 2025, and programs dedicated to solving Delta water quality problems are significantly underfunded. To meet salmon doubling goals, mitigate harmful algal blooms, and reduce water pollution for recreation, the Delta watershed needs greater unimpaired, science-based flows. California does not need a tunnel that will cost tens of billions of dollars strapping municipal water district ratepayers.

We will be one step closer to water equity in California by resisting attempts to divide environmental justice communities and greenwashing bad plans like the Delta tunnel. Rather, we need to start building genuine and honest relationships with all regions of California to solve our climate-water challenges for the entire state.