This Thursday, the highly controversial H.R. 1837 (Nunes, R-Visalia) will be presented at a hearing convened by the House of Representative’s Water and Power Subcommittee. H.R. 1837 aims to overturn many years worth of carefully crafted state and federal water plans and agreements, designed remedy damage caused by the federal Central Valley Project (CVP). The Central Valley Project’s canals run from northern California into our Central Valley; bring water to Central Valley Agriculture and other water contract holders. H.R. 1837 will largely benefit junior federal water contractors, primarily Westlands Water District, by giving them permanent contracts for water provided through the federal CVP, at the expense of much of the state’s senior water right holders.

If passed, the legislation would scrap the hundred of millions of state and federal dollars spent on scientific reviews of the impacts of pumping excessive amounts of water south if the Delta and exempt these water exports from state and federal laws and regulations enacted to ensure a fair distribution of scarce public water supplies. This bill would result in disastrous impacts on the Bay-Delta, the salmon fishery, senior water rights holders and the prospects for the Bay Delta Conservation Plan (BDCP) and thwarts any effort to make positive progress in the Delta.