State Budget Gap Solved by Sale of Department of Water Resources
It was announced today that the Department of Water Resources (DWR) has been formally sold to the State and Federal Water Contractors Association. The $5 billion price will substantially reduce this year’s state budget deficit and the merger will remove much lingering public confusion.
Web-cast of Joint California Water Plan/BDCP Meeting
To make their planning processes more transparent and efficient, the California Water Plan and the Bay Delta Conservation Plan (BDCP) have agreed to combine and web-cast their agency meetings. Here is the link for the webcast of their first joint meeting: http://youtu.be/YawagQ6lLrA
Urban-to-Urban Delta Water Transfer Announced to Aid US Trade Balance with China
Hebei Province in northern China announced today that it was seeking to purchase water from the California State Water Project for transfer to the growing, water-short Beijing metropolitan area. Water would be loaded on ships at the ports of Stockton and West Sacramento for through-Delta export. Proponents are planning to purchase the available water from cities in Southern California and the Bay Area. A Hebei Province spokesman said, “This would be a win-win-win, supporting economic activity for Delta port cities, urban water conservation, and net Delta outflows all the way out the Golden Gate. We didn’t want to buy water from agriculture because we need California’s abundant fruits and nuts.”
Delta Combat Science Meeting
Delta stakeholder scientists prepare to deliver a report to other stakeholders. Intense exchanges are expected to continue.
Delta combat science meeting (Photo: Wikimedia Commons)
State Government Replaced by a Computer
Recent budget shortfalls have led the State to replace several departments with an automated computer program. The simple program takes all public and bureaucratic requests, inquiries, and input, consults an immense database of state regulations and procedures, and then replies, “No”. “As we were working on the software, we discovered that there were almost no cases where the legal, regulatory, and administrative response to a question would be yes,” reported Chief Programmer George Orwell. A spokesman for the Governor’s office indicated that the new system would be put in place as soon as the CA Department of General Services (DGS) approves the purchase of a computer. “If we can get just one positive response from the human bureaucracy, we can reduce staffing for entire departments to a single server technician.”
Farm Hatcheries Found to Reduce Farm Fitness
Subsidies for water and infrastructure have been found to reduce the agricultural fitness of wild farmers. Subsidized farmers have been driving out wild farmers for several generations now. A United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) spokesman indicated that the competitiveness of wild farmers has been reduced by federal and state spending of millions of dollars a year on various subsidies.
The CALSIM model, a “comprehensive and powerful modeling tool for water resources systems simulation”, explained: http://is.gd/77KvTv
New Delta aqueduct constructed with agencies' draft plans (Photo: Wikimedia Commons)
Draft Plans Made into Bricks for New Delta Aqueduct
Draft plans from the many state, federal, and local agencies involved in California planning will be recycled into bricks for constructing a new Delta aqueduct, dams to expand California’s water storage capacity, and flood control levees. “We figured we would re-use these resources for a constructive purpose. This also allows us to partially finance these projects using carbon sequestration credits,” said one agency spokesman. “They finally found a way for these plans to hold water,” said an environmental spokesman.
Zombie escapes from water meeting (Photo: Wikimedia Commons)
Zombies Escape from California Water Meetings
Brain-eating zombies are emerging from major water meetings throughout California. “The meetings began eating our brains away, and then we found that we liked eating brains as well,” said a recent meeting attendee. A walking dead DWR consultant further observed, “Consensus is now achieved. We can have peace in our time.”
Other Headlines You May Have Missed:
- Pirates Boost Delta Economy
- State to Restore the Salton Sink
- Lawyers find Gold in Delta and behind Klamath Dams
- Secret Tunnel completed from Columbia River to LA
- “Flush twice for LA”: Sacramento Wastewater Treatment Plant becomes PC Intake #1, Stockton Strives to be #2
- The Biologist with the Smelt Tattoo
- New Delta Policy: Adaptive management through litigation
(Hope you enjoyed this April Fool’s Round-up. None of this should be taken seriously and if you didn’t find humor in at least one of these topics, you might be a zombie. No delta smelt were pepper-sprayed in the making of this blog.)
Further Reading:
Blogs, blogs everywhere…, California WaterBlog, April 1, 2011