Rising seas will irrevocably change life near the San Francisco Bay. That’s the premise of RISE: Climate Change and Coastal Communities, a three-part documentary by independent producer Claire Schoen. The final part, “Chuey’s Story,” airs this evening at 8 pm on KQED Public Radio.

By Claire Schoen

Jan Sturmann

Chuey Cazares works as a fisherman out of the South Bay town of Alviso. Adapting to climate change may save his town, but it's having unintended consequences for his livelihood.

There’s an old adage that goes something like this: “The human capacity to create technology exceeds our capacity to understand its impact.”

Lots of people have referred to this idea, Einstein perhaps most famously when he said, “The unleashed power of the atom has changed everything save our modes of thinking and we thus drift toward unparalleled catastrophe.” Splitting the atom certainly brought us the promise of unlimited energy to run industry and military might to protect the world from Hitler. It also brought us a nuclear North Korea and Fukushima.

Climate change is the biggest unintended consequence of all. The Industrial Revolution was fueled by coal and oil, creating the foundation for modern society. What we did not know is that burning fossil fuels would alter the composition of the atmosphere and ocean so radically that it is now changing the climate of our planet.

Climate change has also created unintended consequences for our built environment. Most major cities the world sprouted near water, which provides transportation, irrigation, indeed sustenance for humans. To create these cities, forests have been clear cut, wetlands filled, waterways straightened – with the best of intentions.

But this past decade of record-breaking weather has brought unprecedented flooding to coastal towns. A single storm may be a chance occurrence, but this pattern of wild weather squares with climate change models. Along with sea level rise – linked to melting icecaps, linked to rising temperatures -– extreme wind and rain threaten coastal communities around the world.

This is the subject of “Chuey’s Story,” the third program in the RISE series. While we must adapt to climate change, it will not be easy. It will be a messy process. And some people will gain while others lose out.

To explore this idea, I turned to Alviso, a little town at the southern tip of the San Francisco Bay. Alviso is threatened by flooding from rivers that flow from above and from the Bay at its feet. Both flood risks will be made far worse by climate change. Government planners have solutions and are working to save Alviso. But for Chuey Cazares, whose Mexican-American family has lived in this town for generations, these solutions come with unintended consequences.

Today, the vast majority of climate scientists understand the dire threat of this unintended consequence. Yet we are so dependent on fossil fuels and so beholden to the corporations that extract, sell and burn them that we are unable to take the steps necessary to turn the Titanic around.

What to do? Can more technology wean us from our addiction to fossil fuels? And what are the unintended consequences of these new solutions? Corn ethanol, which looked so promising a few decades ago, has a dark side. Growing corn for fuel may mean less land and water to grow food. And the fossil fuel needed to create corn ethanol greatly reduces its benefit. Carbon sequestration is held up as the next savior. Will leaking CO2 from underground reservoirs become an unintended consequence of this venture?

In any case, making the switch to green energy – while still vital – is no longer enough. There is an increasing realization that we are now past a tipping point. No matter what we do to slow our release of greenhouse gases, we can no longer stop climate change altogether. It’s time to get serious about adapting to the sea level rise and extreme weather that is coming our way.

Jan Sturmann

Chuey Cazares (right) and his cousin Jose Lujan have lived all their lives in Alviso, California. But climate change threatens their town, which sits several feet below sea level.

When Hurricane Katrina struck in the late summer of 2005, wetlands could have buffered New Orleans from a record 29-foot storm surge. But a million acres of wetlands had been wiped out as the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers dredged channels in the Mississippi River over the decades. In Alaska, houses in the Inuit village of Shishmaref are literally falling into the Chukchi Sea, as the permafrost melts beneath them and storms attack the coastline. The entire village is making plans to relocate. The Netherlands is struggling to figure out how to build their dikes higher and higher in the face of a rising tide.

Restoring wetlands and building more levees are proving both difficult and costly. And if we have learned nothing else, we must now recognize that adaptation itself comes with its own set of unintended consequences.

Part 3 of RISE, entitled “Chuey’s Story” airs on KQED Public Radio tonight. All three parts and additional multimedia are available on the RISE website.

Tyche Hendricks/KQED

After a record dry December, there's finally snow on the ground near Soda Springs, at Lake Tahoe.

This morning’s snow survey (PDF) didn’t turn up any big surprises. As remote sensors foreshadowed, water content in the Sierra snowpack is 37% of normal for this time of year, and less than a quarter of the average for April, which is when the snowpack is usually at its peak before it begins melting and filling up California’s reservoirs.

What’s worrisome about that, according to Jeanine Jones, Interstate Resources Manager at the Department of Water Resources, is that about half of California’s annual precipitation typically falls between December and February, months that are mostly already behind us. “So where we are this year is: November was dry, December was close to record dry, January was maybe half of average,” Jones told me. “And currently the forecast for the first  ten days or so of February is essentially dry.”

The above chart, from the Department of Water Resources, shows that this year — the pink line — isn’t quite the worst on record, but it’s a lot closer to the bottom than it is to boom years like 1982-’83 (the blue dotted line), or even last year (in green). Jones says luckily, last year was wet enough, that we’re still riding its coattails. Most of the state’s reservoirs (PDF) still hover around their averages for the year.

“In terms of impacts to water users this year, the fact that we have good storage conditions courtesy of a wet last year is helpful,” she said. “And a good take-home message here is that we need to think about preparing for the possibility of a dry 2013, because we won’t be going into 2013 with the kind of carryover storage we have now, both in reservoir storage and groundwater basins.”

But, Jones adds, Californians will feel impacts from this dry winter. “The people who rely soley on annual rainfall: the grazing industry, dry-land farming, potential wildfire conditions, and then small water systems in rural areas that are dependent on fractured rock groundwater aquifers that may have very minimal recharge, those are the kinds of typical examples in a year like this.”

And winter’s not over yet. Jones says it’s not likely, but there is the chance that a big storm event could still happen and help catch us up.

The Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta is a key to the water supply for 25 million Caliornians.

Quick: What is the Sacramento Delta?

Not where. What. According to a new statewide poll commissioned by Southern California water interests, three out of four surveyed could not answer that question correctly…or at all. This despite the fact that the maze of channels around the confluence of the Sacramento and San Joaquin River is a crucial cog in the water supply of 25 million Californians and the subject of intense, ongoing political and legal skirmishes.

According to Probolsky Research, which conducted the survey, 78% of respondents statewide said they either knew nothing about the Delta or hadn’t heard of it. About four percent knew that it plays a role in supporting endangered fish species, but only 2.3% cited the Delta as a “source of water.” (The poll has a margin of error of +/- 3.7%). Water from California’s northern rivers is funneled from the Delta to serve thirsty customers as far south as San Diego.

At least one recorded response was that the Delta is “the oil line from Canada to the United States,” an apparent confusion with the highly publicized Keystone XL pipeline proposal. Despite the sketchy notions that Californians appear to have about the Delta, a significant majority in the survey (60.4%) said they support or were leaning in favor of the multi-billion-dollar bond for water improvements set to appear on the statewide ballot in November. About a third said they would “definitely vote yes” were the election held today.

The survey was released by the Southern California Water Committee, a self-described “public education partnership” looking out for the Southland’s stake in the nascent Bay Delta Conservation Plan.

In the same survey, the environment scored a meager three percent when respondents were asked to name the “most important issue facing your community.” Jobs (53.5%), public safety (14.3), government (13.5) and education (10.7) were the only issues cited by more than ten percent of respondents.

NOAA

How do you define a "drought?"

As state surveyors trudge into the mountains this week for the season’s second official survey of the Sierra snowpack, the auspices aren’t good. Remote sensors currently show that statewide, water content is averaging just 38% of the average for this date, and less than a quarter of what water managers would hope to see on April first — just two months away.

Consequently, the “D-word” is being nervously bandied about. Are we in a drought?

The state’s newly revamped Current Water Conditions website takes on the question with a definitive “Yes and no.” Drought status, it says “can be very different depending on your location.”

Matthew Heberger agrees. An analyst for the Oakland-based Pacific Institute and co-author of The World’s Water (Vol. 7), Heberger told me in a recent interview that it “absolutely depends on your perspective.” And that perspective is ruled by more than geography.

“I’m a hydrologist by training, so for a hydrologist, a drought would be reflected in changes in the natural environment,” he explained. “So, changes in ground water levels, lake levels, stream flows, things like that.”

Heberger went on to offer some other perspectives:

• “You have a different perspective if you’re a water manager; you care really about what’s the water level in the reservoir.”
• “An aerologist [atmospheric scientist] might define it based on rainfall levels.”
• “An agronomist interested in agriculture would say a drought is when soil moisture levels are below what you need to grow healthy crops.”

I’ll add that suburban homeowners might say it’s a drought when they’re told they can’t water their lawns. “So yeah,” agreed Heberger. “There are a bunch of different definitions for drought out there.”

It is perhaps because experts agree on the highly subjective nature of drought, that few of them seem willing to commit and say if we’re in one (or not). But most seem to agree that time is running out on the catch-up clock.

According to the Department of Water Resources, “the three-storm series that began January 19 added nearly seven inches to the northern Sierra precipitation for the year.” That brought average precipitation for the season from a dismal 30% of “normal” to more than half the average. Snow pack catapulted from 10% to 33% of average, an impressive leap from a few wet days. But there’s been little or nothing to show since then. And as the “wet season” withers, the odds portend another summer of thirsty crops, possible restrictions on urban water use, and a general increase in the number of people declaring a “drought.”

Kimberly Ayers

Is the 2012 water bond heading for the drain?

“There are two subjects water people least want to talk about: politics and money,” said the former head of the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power, David Nahai. He was speaking at the “Future of Water in Southern California” conference on a dry and windy Friday, here in the City of Angels. And those two were the uncomfortable topics State Senate President Pro Tem Darrell Steinberg (D-Sacramento) talked about in his lunch hour keynote.

Sponsored by UCLA’s Luskin School of Public Affairs, the conference was generously sprinkled with Southland water and sanitation district staff. They’d just spent the morning presenting new ideas for water “banking,” and new technologies for advanced recycling, and Steinberg knew the idea of less money would not wash down well with the noontime pasta salad and sandwiches. In fact, a proposal to cut 25% from each project in the water bond measure even failed an Assembly committee vote on Jan. 10th.

As our interactive map (below) shows, the $11.1 billion proposal’s largest proposals are for water storage, Bay-Delta sustainability, groundwater clean-up, and advanced water treatment and recycling.

View KQED: California’s Water Bond – Where Would the Money Go? in a larger map

The Association of California Water Agencies (ACWA) is already on record as opposing any reduction, calling the cut “premature” in Capitol testimony earlier this month. In an Op-Ed piece for the Sacramento Bee, ACWA chief Timothy Quinn — also a former head of the Southern California Metropolitan Water District — brandished a Field survey it commissioned in which 84% of voters agreed, “the state has major water problems and must invest in its water infrastructure to ensure reliable water now and in future years.” And 64% said “investing billions of dollars in a state bond package (such as the one on the November ballot) would be worth it to ensure reliable water supplies.”

Steinberg conceded that most think the bond is “too large,” and critics say it’s overladen with pork. “I can accept that but one person’s pork is another person’s regional water solution,” Steinberg told the gathering. “We’re not going to be able to sell an $11 billion bond to voters during a very precarious period of economic recovery.” The alternative numbers he gently lobbed were in the range of seven-to-ten billion dollars.

A nationwide poll, “The Value of Water,” by hydro technology firm Xylem, Inc., showed — as of 18 months ago — water users were up for spending 11% more a month to upgrade their water systems. But the Natural Resources Defense Council had postprandial admonitions about the need to get truly creative with water system financing. NRDC’s David Beckman pointed to the group’s Center for Market Innovation, which is working to create large-scale private sector financing for energy efficiency projects.

In closing, Steinberg floated a compromise: “The choice may be do it our way and risk getting nothing or do the best we can — albeit with a smaller bond.”

Dan Brekke

Highway 120 in Yosemite National Park winds toward Tioga Pass. The road closed Tuesday night after its longest winter opening since at least 1933.

It first captivated me back when I was an adolescent map reader back in the Midwest. I was poring over maps of California for a trip that didn’t happen—then—and took note of the roads across the Sierra Nevada. And the highest of all the mountain routes I could see crossed Tioga Pass, at an altitude that rounds to 10,000 feet. Nearly two miles above sea level.

Eventually I took that trip to California, but it was still a long time before I actually saw the place the map depicted. A good 15 years or so after I moved out here, I managed to scramble up there on a long weekend and spent a single afternoon driving Highway 120, the Tioga Road.

The stark beauty of the Sierra always manages to surprise me, but there’s an extra degree of immediacy to the grandeur along the road to the pass. After rising through a stretch densely lined with conifers, you emerge into a world of granite domes and alpine meadows. It almost seems wrong to be driving through this landscape instead of walking through it (although there’s plenty of opportunity to do that on dozens of trails, if you give yourself time). Approaching from the west, the pass itself is a little anticlimactic. You note the country is getting a little drier, you pass the Tioga Pass entrance sign with the announcement of the spot’s elevation—9,943 feet above sea level—and then you begin a nonstop plummet toward the town of Lee Vining and Mono Lake.

The feeling I came away with, and that I’ve experienced every time I’ve been across the road, is a sense of having been allowed to see a stretch of road that’s a little bit of a secret – it’s much less traveled than most routes into and out of Yosemite – and, without having had to work very hard for it, have been given access to one of California’s greatest treasures.

All of which goes to explain that when high country fanatics began writing about how the road was open in December because of this season’s dry weather, I got the urge to go up there and see what the winter scene looked like. And at the first excuse, I headed up to the pass.

That feeling of being allowed to enter a special world was stronger than ever. I hadn’t planned on doing a radio piece about the trip, but I had brought my little sound kit, which fits into a fanny pack, just in case. When I climbed out of the car at Tenaya Lake, elevation 8,150 feet, I slowly realized that the weird moaning-whale song sound I was hearing was the lake’s thick ice expanding in the sunlight. I just had to record that. And then maybe talk to some people.

Virtually everyone I talked to on the lake and later, on a trail above Tioga Pass, shared the opinion that this was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, to be able to drive into the middle of the high country. They talked about the special quality of the winter light on the landscape, the opportunity to change their usual winter routines of snow shoveling and skiing, and the simple amazement they felt in being able to walk and skate and picnic nearly two miles above sea level—in the middle of January.

Dan Brekke

Gaylor Lakes Trail, elevation 10,500 feet, just above Tioga Pass in Yosemite National Park. In the center background, Dana Meadows. This area is typically snowed in by Thanksgiving and the Tioga Road through the area is normally closed until late spring or early summer.

But people also talked about the disturbing part of what they were seeing. Long-time Californians seem to develop an ingrained understanding of the state’s hydrological equations and how important the Sierra Nevada winter snowpack is to maintaining a healthy environment, not to mention delivering water to farms and cities. And looking around, people expressed some worry about the beautiful but mostly snow-free country around them. (A data point here: The daily snow survey summary from the state Department of Water Resources show that the statewide average for snow-water equivalent in the mountains is just 10% of normal. It will be most interesting to see how that changes as the current series of winter storms blows through).

And people have longer term concerns about what they’ve seen along the Tioga Road this season. The person who put it best is someone I did not talk to on my trans-Sierra excursion. Beth Pratt, a California outdoors and environment blogger, made a series of trips across Highway 120 during our weird winter idyll. Her enthusiasm and wonder for the spectacle she’s seen are infectious. But it’s also tempered by thoughts of the future:

“Bottom line: for a Yosemite and Sierra aficionado like me, having access this late is akin to winning the lottery. Of course when I have no drinking water next summer, I might feel differently. The lack of snow is alarming and the landscape is more reminiscent of spring than winter. Although it’s difficult to associate any one weather event or season to climate change, welcome to the Sierra Nevada of the future. I have seen predictions under the best case warming scenarios of an 80% reduction in snowpack. The Sierra can often deliver a wallop of a storm anytime of year, and I have no doubt we’ll recover at least some of the snow–this year at least. But this may be a warning from the ghost of the Sierra future.”

“Ghost of Sierra future?” Those words will stick with me. But for today, I’m glad to know that the snow’s flying again across the Tioga Road.

Justin Sullivan/Getty

Governor Jerry Brown spent much of his State of the State address on California's environmental goals.

In a speech described by one Orange County Republican as “vintage Jerry,” Governor Jerry Brown tried to re-conjure the image of California as a can-do state. Brown also devoted a large portion of his annual State of the State address to environmental and climate-related topics.

Showing none of the climate timidity that has overtaken national politics, Brown declared that, “fossil fuels, particularly foreign oil, create ever rising costs to our economy and to our health.” By contrast, President Obama avoided using the word “climate” even once in last year’s State of the Union message, and gave global warming only the slightest nod in a recent address to science-friendly staffers at the Environmental Protection Agency.

While job creation was at the top of Brown’s eight-point list of New Year’s resolutions, it was quickly followed by:

• Build renewable energy
• Reduce pollution and greenhouse gasses
• Launch the nation’s only high-speed rail system
• Reach agreement on a plan to fix the Delta

Referring to a long-awaited long-term management plan for the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta, Brown went as far as attaching a timeline, saying, “By this summer we should have the basic elements of the project we need to build.” More than 20 million Californians depend, to some degree, on the Delta for water.

While not adding too much detail, Brown warned Californians of what lies ahead:

“This is an enormous project. It will ensure water for 25 million Californians and for millions of acres of farmland as well a hundred thousand acres of new habitat for spawning fish and other wildlife. To get it done will require time, political will and countless permits from state and federal agencies. I invite your collaboration and constructive engagement.”

Brown cited California’s leadership in, “encouraging electric vehicles and reducing pollution and greenhouse gases,” but — as was the case at his one-day climate conference in December — passed on the opportunity to announce any major new initiatives.

Brown has set a personal goal of “20,000 megawatts of renewable energy by 2020,” though that remains a moral challenge, not a legal mandate. California law now requires utilities to derive a third of their electricity purchases from renewables by the same date. “I can tell you we are on track to meet that goal and substantially exceed it,” said Brown.

The Governor cited a recent cooperative arrangement struck with the federal Department of the Interior for getting projects sited, and noted that, “In the last two years alone, California has permitted over 16,000 megawatts of solar, wind and geothermal energy projects.”

The entire text of the speech is available on the Governor’s website.

Penny Crane/USWFS

Coho salmon turn red in their spawning stage.

The endangered coho salmon, which has slowly been making a comeback, faces another threat, this time from low flows in the Russian River.

Bob Norberg of the Santa Rosa Press Democrat has been reporting on the plight of the coho.

A major difficulty brought by reduced rain is the fish are still in the Russian River’s main stem rather than in the tributaries where they are usually spawning by now.

As a result, the Sonoma County Water Agency is distributing 20,000 cards with pictures and identifying characteristics at places where fishing licenses are purchased, in addition to the 20,000 printed two years ago.

“We kept hearing from people that there were coho in the river and we were hearing that the anglers would not be able to tell the difference and they would keep the coho,” said Ann DuBay, water agency spokeswoman.

NOAA

This map shows the rivers in central California where endangered coho salmon live.

Coho are native to the Russian River. Biologists say the Russian River coho are genetically distinct from coho found in other California rivers. For the past ten years an Army Corps of Engineers conservation program has worked to breed wild fish and release them into the river to spawn. Slowly the coho populations have grown, but the recent dry weather is an unwelcome setback to their fragile gains.

Rising seas will irrevocably change life near the San Francisco Bay. That’s the premise of RISE: Climate Change and Coastal Communities, a three-part documentary by producer Claire Schoen. The second part, “Facing the Rising Tide,” airs this evening at 8 pm on KQED Public Radio.

Opinion by Claire Schoen

Jan Sturmann

Steve Mello's family has been farming this land in the Delta for generations. Climate change may prevent his son from carrying on the family legacy.

I recently dug out an old letter which I had written to my Dad back in 1982. “Have you heard about this thing called Global Warming?” I asked.

Back in the 80’s, I was already aware of what is now referred to as “climate change.” So why is it that so few Americans understand this threat today?

In fact, America is in retreat on the subject. According to Pew Research, the number of Americans who believe the planet is warming dropped by 20 percent from 2006 (79%) to 2010 (59%). “Believe.” As if this scientific phenomenon were a belief system, a question of faith.

This drives me crazy. Especially in the face of the overwhelming consensus in the scientific community that climate change is very real, man-made and increasing at a rate that is outstripping even the worst projections.

And it’s no secret. There is a treasure trove of information to be found at the click of a mouse. Indeed, it’s hard not to trip over it. For example, it took me about 2 minutes to pull up statements attesting to climate change from scientific societies in the US, the United Kingdom, Japan, Canada, France, Germany, India, Russia, Italy, China, Brazil, Australia and New Zealand. Everybody’s got one.

And yet so many people don’t get it. Or don’t want to get it. Or when they do get it, say it’s not really that important. Why is that? This was one of the questions I set out to explore in the RISE series. And it’s the focus of Part II: “Facing the Rising Tide.”

Jan Sturmann

Steve Mello and his son, Gary. They grow corn on Tyler Island, which is protected by levies.

In telling this story, I met two very different families, both smart, educated, thoughtful. The Mellos are Delta farmers whose roots in the land go generations deep. Their talk of family, tradition, and legacy trumps the reality of climate change. The Fosters are urban land developers who have done extremely well financially by turning wetlands into real estate. Facing climate change is a threat to their investments. So, economics and lifestyle are, perhaps, two of the reasons for the wall of denial that America has constructed.

But I think there are others. There is a campaign of disinformation, underwritten by the oil business. And there is Fox News. I ran into an interesting study a few months back that found that people who watch Fox news are less well informed than people who pay no attention to news of any sort.

But I put the blame on public television and radio as well. Living in fear of being cut off by Congress and abandoned by their “enhanced underwriters” (don’t call them advertisers!), public broadcasting bends over backwards in the service of fairness and balance. So here is what we get: “Is there climate change? Or isn’t there climate change? Let’s have a debate.” On one side is a climate denier who represents a fraction of a percent of the scientific community and is most probably funded by a think tank that’s funded by an oil company. On the other side is a climate scientist who represents 99% of the scientific community. One side versus the other. Fair and Balanced. And the take-away for the public is, “Hmm…maybe there is and maybe there isn’t.”

And then there is the tyranny of the news headline. When strident, internal emails from the IPCC (the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) were first leaked, they screamed across the front page of the major dailies like a house on fire: “Faulty Data on Climate Change!” After thorough and exhaustive review, it was found that the emails may have been snippy and inappropriate. But none of the scientific data was invalidated. This follow-up was buried on page 14.

Religion is also part of the problem. A few months ago I attended a Seventh Day Adventist church service. The congregation was very welcoming, pressing a Bible into my hands. The preacher was a delight; thumping and stomping. It made you want to shout out, as many people were doing.

“Have you noticed what’s going on!” cried the preacher, to a wave of “Amen! Tell it, brother!”

“The floods, the hurricanes, the droughts, the heat waves, the cold snaps. They are raining down on our people like a plague from heaven.”

Right on! I thought. He’s preaching on climate change.

Silly me.

“The end times are at our door,” the preacher continued. “The rapture is about to begin!”

So, do I need to drive an electric car? Put up solar panels? Insulate my house? Why no! All I need to do is get right with God, so that I may be lifted above the fire and brimstone.

Sigh.

Meanwhile in 2010, global emissions of carbon dioxide from fossil fuels rose by 5.9%. It was the largest increase on record.

Part 3 of RISE, entitled “Facing the Rising Tide” airs on KQED Public Radio, on February 9. All parts and additional multimedia are available on the RISE website.

California Department of Water Resources

Increased flood risk in the Sacramento/San Joaquin River Delta has people worried about the economic impact on the farmers and residents located there.

Here’s the bad news for Delta farmers: A new report concludes that the worst climate impacts on the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta could affect a relatively small number of people — the farmers whose land is below sea level and protected by a vast system of levees. Maintaining and repairing those levees falls on local reclamation districts, which can’t necessarily count on state or federal bailouts in the event of catastrophic flooding in the future. It can be expensive if a levee breaks. The Public Policy Institute of California (PPIC) studied the economic impacts of changes to the fragile Delta ecosystem and has produced some recommendations that are not likely to warm the hearts of some Delta landowners.

The most flood-prone areas could see their local economy shrink by 15% over the next several decades as waters rise, reclaiming land and wiping out cropland. This area is called the “primary zone” in flood-manager lingo. It makes up almost two-thirds of the Delta’s area but accounts for only four percent of its economic activity. That’s because the population centers and accompanying services are mostly in the “secondary zone,” where the land is higher and development less limited.

The report takes a pragmatic approach: As flooding threatens more Delta land, it may not make sense to repair every levee, especially as state and federal funds for flood protection dwindle and local reclamation districts are left taking up the slack. On some islands, “The economic value of the assets on the island and the value of agricultural production is not high enough to cover the cost of fixing an island after the levees would break and the island would flood,” Ellen Hanak, an economist with PPIC and one of the authors of the report told me. She recounted the story of a  2004 levee break on the Jones Tract, one of the Delta’s islands, which cost $90 million to repair. “That was the state that paid it,” she said.

California Department of Water Resources

The Blacklock restoration area near Suisun City.

Hanak and her colleagues say state planners should think beyond resisting change in the area. They recommend a Delta levee policy that focuses resources to protect the most valuable land. They also recommend taking steps toward mitigating the economic impact on the people living in the primary zone. “There really is a need to think about softening the cost of adjustment that residents within the inner-Delta are likely to face as a result of changes in the landscape from flooding” she warned. The good news, she says, is that if the state is faced with compensating landowners, the bill should be relatively digestible for California taxpayers.

The Delta does not grow as many high value crops as the rest of the Central Valley. “A lot of times people describe Delta agriculture as high-value fruits and vegetable agriculture,” Hanak explained. “But in fact within the Delta there is actually much more land devoted to what people call ‘field crops’ — grain and hay — rather than fruits and vegetables and nuts.” That’s likely because farmers don’t want to risk tree crops in the flood-prone area. It also means that the value of the agricultural assets isn’t as high and thus repairing flooded islands may not be worth it when budgets at every level are stretched thin.