Department of Justice, State of California - Comments Regarding Pacific Southwest Water Plan

Document: Comments re Pacific Southwest Water Plan, submitted by Stanley Mosk, Department of Justice, State of California, October 28, 1963, page 10In summary, this is the decision and its effect in terms of the permanent water supply determined by the California engineers: (a) The Court eliminated tributary uses from the water supply allocated among Arizona, California, and Nevada. The effect is to reduce California's entitlement from 4.6 million acre-feet per year to no more than 4.4 million acre-feet per year. (b) The Court decided not to rule how shortages shall be allocated if there is less than 7.5 million acre-feet available for consumptive use from the main stream. How to allocate shortages will be decided in the first instance by the Secretary of the Interior or by Congress, subject to review by the Court. In any allocation the Secretary must respect priorities of "present perfected rights" (still undefined). (c) All water available from the main stream in excess of 4.4 million acre-feet for California up to a total supply of 7.5 million acre-feet is made available for projects in Arizona and Nevada. Under present conditions of upper basin development, that quantity is the full 3.1 million acre-feet. If permanently available, it would be enough to supply those states' present projects, the Central Arizona Project (planned to divert 1.2 million acre-feet), and the new projects sought by Nevada. Prompt construction of Arizona and Nevada projects will hasten the disappearance of the presently unused water temporarily available to sustain California's current consumptive use of about 5.1 million acre-feet.* 4. Elements of a Water Supply Determination The foregoing summary of the effect of the decision in Arizona v. California should be reviewed in the light of all information which has become available since 1957 when the California evidence of water supply was presented. It should also be noted that both Arizona and the United States vigorously disagreed with the California evidence, contending that it seriously understated the supply. They did not say by how much. The Special Master told the Court that water supply is abundant, but incapable of determination. He declared in his report that * The 5.1 million acre-feet is in consumptive use, and hence not inconsistent with the statement in the Secretary's Plan that California has been diverting in excess of 5.5 million acre-feet in recent years (II-7 - II-8). Palo Verde Irrigation District and the Reservation Division of the Yuma Project in California have substantial return flows to the river, deducted from the computation of consumptive use. 10.Epson Perfection 4870 Photo, 400 dpi, 8 bit, 1,575,328 byte