tulare Archives - SJV Water

Valley agencies in a race against winter and a fast-approaching state deadline to repair flood damage

September 22, 2023

• by Lisa McEwen, SJV Water

All across Tulare County, the race is on to repair flood-damaged infrastructure before an anticipated El Niño winter and an even more looming expiration of Gov. Gavin Newsom’s executive order that relaxed permitting for levee work and debris clean up. The work has lagged, though, as creeks and rivers are still flowing or the ground…

Floods

VIDEO: Months after historic flooding swamped some rural Central Valley towns, residents are still struggling to rebuild their lives

August 9, 2023

• by Jesse Vad, SJV Water

California’s Central Valley was slammed by one epic storm after another this winter. The water flooded roads, overtopped rivers, broke levees and swamped entire towns. Without flood insurance and few other resources, residents of these mostly small, rural enclaves have had to rely on family, friends and neighors to rebuild. Months later, many are still…

Floods

Raising the Corcoran levee on sinking ground

May 4, 2023

• by Lois Henry

The Corcoran levee is being raised – again. The fear is it won’t be high enough as runoff from record breaking snowpack above several rivers that feed into the old Tulare Lake gets underway. Before repair work got started the levee stood at 188 feet. That’s four feet shorter than when it was last…

Floods

Kaweah River water managers prepare for more high water as the valley heats up

April 27, 2023

• by Jesse Vad, SJV Water

Water managers along the Kaweah River system have been frantically maintaining waterways as high flows continue chugging through the system. But even as snowmelt begins and flows increase, there isn’t a risk of flooding yet, according to state officials. The Kaweah River flows from Lake Kaweah through Terminus Dam. Below the dam, it has multiple…

Policy

Tiny, rural Allensworth takes on climate change with help from state grant

November 8, 2022

• by Jesse Vad, SJV Water

The fight against climate change is coming to the small town of Allensworth in Tulare County. The state awarded $300,000 to the Allensworth Progressive Association, a local nonprofit, to “implement neighborhood-level projects that reduce greenhouse gas emissions, improve public health and the environment and expand economic opportunity for residents,” according to a press release from…

SGMA

Groundwater agencies at the epicenter of sinking beneath the Friant-Kern Canal have restricted pumping, raised fees in hopes of curbing water table free fall

March 29, 2022

• by Jesse Vad, SJV Water

Three Tulare County groundwater agencies that cover areas with severe subsidence due to over pumping spent the last year implementing programs to stem that tide and collected more than $11 million in the process. The Lower Tule River Irrigation District, Pixley Irrigation District and Eastern Tule groundwater sustainability agencies (GSA) are among the first to…

Friant-Kern Canal

State money for canal fixes set to start flowing

November 30, 2021

• by Lois Henry

The state Department of Water Resources opened the spigot Tuesday on the first $100 million, of $200 million, budgeted over the next two fiscal years to fix several key canals that have sunk because of groundwater pumping. Subsidence has reduced carrying capacity in the canals from 15% up to 60% in the Friant-Kern Canal, which…

Drinking Water • Drought

Valley wells already going dry as drought settles in

May 27, 2021

• by Jesse Vad, SJV Water reporting intern

Dry wells are starting to crop up throughout California’s San Joaquin Valley as the 2021 drought digs in. And as the parched state barrels toward summer, the risk of more wells going dry is increasing. For some, that possibility is already a scary reality. Misty Vasquez was at work in December, when her husband called…