2011-04-01 "California’s 'Dust Bowl Drought' that Really Never Happened - is Officially Over!" by Patrick Porgans
[http://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2011/04/01/18676111.php]
(916) 833-8734 [pp @ planetaraysolutionaries.org]
No; it is not an April Fool’s Joke Governor Jerry Brown’s recent announcement that California’s “drought” is officially over, which critics claimed was grossly exaggerated; government records indicate it may not have happened.
Gov. Brown’s Proclamation officially rescinds former Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger’s Executive Order S-06-08, issued on June 4, 2008 and ends the States of Emergency called on June 12, 2008, and on February 27, 2009.
It took as much as 50 feet of snowpack, which blanketed the roughed Sierra Nevada Mountains, all of the state’s major reservoirs full or overflowing, many of which are making floodwater releases to provide room for spring runoff, and the Golden State at “ground saturation, before the Governor’s water advisors to confirm the “drought emergency” was over.
Ironically, doubts were raised at the time former Gov. Schwarzenegger issued the “drought proclamation”, which he issued at the very onset of a below-average water year; slightly less than the “average” amount of precipitation and water runoff received statewide.
Last, year, for example, California received more than 110 percent of “average” precipitation, and statewide reservoir capacity reach 95 percent. At the end of that year, the “fourth” year of the “drought” federal and state water “experts” were at odds as to whether the drought was over; state officials took the position it wasn’t.
A series of in-depth reports, based entirely on government documents, revealed that the so-called “drought” was not only significantly overstated but, revealed serious doubts as to whether it actually happened. For example, for the four year period (water-years 2007 through 2011), at which time the “drought proclamation” was in effect, California received 85 percent of “average” precipitation, and the “average” water storage, based on “averages”, in its major reservoirs, for that period was in the 90 percentile range.
Weather conditions in the Golden State vary from year to year, the “average” precipitation and water runoff varies; it is not unusual to experience wet and dry cycles. In fact, prior to 2007, the state had experienced a series of very wet water years.
When it rains it pours, and if it someone “claims” it doesn’t rain in Sunny California, it pours a torrent of free-flowing “drought-relief” grant funding. Funds that primarily go to benefit government water agencies, their customers, and wealthy landowners and water speculators. This funding mechanism is made possible by using the public’s credit to borrow vast sums of money, which is repaid back by the public-at-large, from the $26 billion deficit-ridden General Fund.
One of the how to get “drought” relief money give-away sessions was held at the Irvine Ranch Water District duck club, which was announced on California Department of Water Resources’ letterhead. The district is a well-healed and politically connected supporter of water development.
Critics contend that the motive behind the drought was essentially a major financial bailout for Gov. Schwarzenegger’s campaign supporters that rely heavily on publicly subsidized water, provided by government water projects, exporting water from the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta to central and southern California. They claim that by issuing the drought proclamation at the onset of the below average conditions, and not declaring the drought as being over in 2010, allowed the flow of cash to continue.
Obviously, the drought proclamation opened up the floodgate to release hundreds of millions of dollars of public moneys used to fund so-called drought relief programs to a host of local water agencies and agricultural recipients [http://www.water.ca.gov/lgagrant/docs/120309grant.pdf].
California recently sold $733 million in bonds to fund drought, flood control and water management projects, and the state is preparing for another bond sale of $400 million for water and drought response, according to a press release issued by the Governor on the 15 April 2009. [gov.ca.gov/press-release/12022].
Lastly, and yet equally important, is when a state-of-emergency is proclaimed, it essentially sets aside many regulatory and environmental safeguards.
Next in the series: Harvesting Windfall Profits from the so-called Drought – While Funds for Public Safety-Net Programs and Jobs Dry Up. Other drought-related stories, published by the author, can be obtained at the following websites: http://www.planetarysolutionaries.org; http://www.lloydgcarter.com or Google “Doubts About the Drought”. Ω
For additional information send request or comments to pp [at] planetarysolutionaries.org