Faced with news of the driest April snowpack in recorded history, Gov. Jerry Brown on Wednesday morning ordered the first-ever statewide mandatory water reductions for Californians.
Standing amid grass, dirt and rocks atop a dry Sierra ridge, Brown announced actions that he vowed will save water, such as instructing officials to cut urban water use by 25 percent, boost enforcement of water-wasting, streamline the state's drought response and invest in new water-saving technologies.
"This historic drought demands unprecedented action," said Brown, joined by state water officials at Echo Summit's Phillips Station off Highway 50, southwest of Lake Tahoe.
"As Californians, we must pull together and save water in every way possible," he said.
The Los Angeles Aqueduct carries water from the snowcapped Sierra Nevada near Lone Pine. (David McNew/Getty Images)
Snow surveyers announced Wednesday that no snow was found at the Phillips site -- the first time in 75 years of early-April measurements. This shatters the previous low record of 25 percent, set last year and in 1977.
This is an anxiously watched rite of spring in drought-stricken California, because snowpack traditionally is at its peak by early April, before it begins to melt.In an average year, there would be 66.5 inches, or 5.5 feet, at the Phillips site.
With the state's historically wettest winter months now gone, the drought is now firmly rooted in its fourth consecutive year.
Californians can expect to receive almost no water from the meager snowpack as it melts in the coming weeks, said Department of Water Resources director Mark Cowin, who joined Brown at the 6,800-foot-high test site, dense with fragrant pine, fir, and cedar.
In the San Francisco Bay Area, some once-green rolling hillsides are already touched with gold, as dry grasses produce seeds.
This dismal news has huge implications for the cities, farms and wildlife that depend on melting snowpack to yield water during the spring, summer and fall.
This will be California's fourth dry year. Groundwater levels continue to drop and key reservoirs remain below average. For instance, the State Water Project's principal reservoir, Lake Oroville, holds 51 percent of its 3.5 million acre-foot capacity.
Across the Sierra, electronic readings indicate the water content of the northern Sierra snowpack on Wednesday was 1.4 inches; central Sierra, 1.5 inches and southern Sierra, 1.3 inches -- all 5 percent of average.
Among other steps, Brown seeks to prohibit new homes from irrigating with potable water unless water-efficient drip irrigation systems are used; ban watering of ornamental grass on public street medians; require campuses, golf courses, cemeteries and other large landscapes to make significant cuts in water use, create a new rebate program to replace old wasteful appliances, and work with local goverments to replace 50 million square feet of lawns throughout the state with drought tolerant landscaping.
So far, the impact of the drought has been felt most acutely by farmers, wildlife, and residents in lower income communities that rely on shallow wells.
Brown's new order means much more aggressive conservation by residents of cities and towns.
The annual April snowpack is a crucial benchmark for state water managers who use the totals to calculate how much the spring snow melt will supply to the state's reservoirs.
After one of the warmest winters on record, the snowpack has declined since a wet December, when electronic readings recorded the snowpack's water content at 50 percent of the Dec. 30 historical average, according to the state Department of Water Resources.
The California Water Foundation's Lester Snow applauded the governor's executive order as "a necessary and critical part of the state's response. With the drought already upon us, there are only so many things the state can do, and today's actions are among them."
He urged Californians to shift away from grass and instead plant more native and drought-tolerant landscaping. He also recommended state reforms to make it easier for someone with water to transfer it to someone who needs it more --including the environment.
"With practically no runoff forecasted from the Sierra into our network of reservoirs and rivers, we are in store for what could be the most challenging summer our farms, our fish and our families have ever witnessed," Snow said in a prepared statement.
"Over the next several months we will see rural communities run out of clean water, crops and trees left to wither, and streams and wetlands dried up, leaving fish and water fowl with nowhere to go."
Check back for more on this story as it develops.
Contact Lisa M. Krieger at 650-492-4098. Follow her at Twitter.com/Lisa M. Krieger.
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