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A plan to build the largest reservoir in California in decades, Sites Reservoir about 70 miles north of Sacramento, is being challenged as ecologically destructive and not worth the cost in a lawsuit filed by environmental groups Wednesday. The $4.5 billion project, which seeks to boost water supplies for drought-plagued cities and farms, was recently put on the fast track by Gov. Gavin Newsom. The suit, though, alleges the reservoir’s environmental impact report was insufficient, failing to address harm to fish and greenhouse gas emissions — problems opponents say make the additional water hard to justify. “It’s not a negligible...

...Claims There Was “Nothing They Could Do,” Blames Residents Who “Lost Everything”; LADWP Project Manager Confesses the Pacific Palisades Reservoir Was Empty for "A Year" “Their yards were out of code. Like, nobody gave a f*ck.” “How long was the reservoir empty?” “Like a year.”

Former and current DWP officials acknowledge that if the reservoir had held water, higher-elevation areas of the Palisades would have had more water pressure, but it’s unclear for how long. The saga traces back to January 2024, when a DWP property manager spotted a tear in the reservoir's floating cover after a series of rainstorms The cover is meant to prevent animals and debris from contaminating the water and to limit algae and bacteria. When a property manager saw the tear again two days later, it seemed to have grown larger, according to the emails. DWP policy calls for minor...

The Los Angeles Times recently reported:https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2025-01-10/as-flames-raged-in-palisades-a-key-reservoir-nearby-was-offlineState to probe why Pacific Palisades reservoir was offline, empty when firestorm explodedJanuary 10, 2025The Santa Ynez complex, at 117 million gallons, is among several sources of water in the area…“It’s completely unacceptable that this reservoir was empty for almost a year for minor repairs,” Gus Corona, business manager of IBEW Local 18, said in an interview with The Times.I’d be curious to know why it takes “almost a year” to carry out “minor repairs.”

The reservoir has been empty as of February of last year and no one told the fire department? And the woman they promoted and pay 750,000 dollars per year to handle that has a job? How? ... One of California's biggest scandals (among many) is the way, way overpaid State public employees and CalPERS. It's outrageous and (related) why even FDR had a major issue with public employee unions. ... The Santa Ynez Reservoir for Pacific Palisades was dry since 2009... How is this possible? ... Well, she is on her 4th job since 2018 so she’s hardly excelling at...

avin Newsom @GavinNewsom NEW: I am calling for an independent investigation into the loss of water pressure to local fire hydrants and the reported unavailability of water supplies from the Santa Ynez Reservoir. We need answers to ensure this does not happen again and we have every resource available to fight these catastrophic fires.

The $750,000-a-year LA water czar is responsible for a raft of failures that contributed to the devastating Palisades Fire, fire department insiders told DailyMail.com. On Mayor Karen Bass's orders, the city maxed out its budget to 'attract private-sector talent', hiring Department of Water and Power (LADWP) CEO Janisse Quiñones on a $750,000 salary in May – almost double that of her predecessor. Now, Quiñones is being blamed by LA Fire Department (LAFD) insiders for leaving a nearby reservoir disconnected and fire hydrants broken for months, DailyMail.com can reveal, leading to firefighters running out of water as they battled the devastating...

A large reservoir in Pacific Palisades that is part of the Los Angeles water supply system was out of use when a ferocious wildfire destroyed thousands of homes and other structures nearby. Officials told The Times that the Santa Ynez Reservoir had been closed for repairs to its cover, leaving a 117 million gallon water storage complex empty in the heart of the Palisades. The revelation comes among growing questions about why firefighters ran out of water while battling the blaze. Numerous fire hydrants in higher-elevation streets of the Palisades went dry, leaving firefighters struggling with low water pressure as...

A Pacific Palisades reservoir was closed when wildfires swept through the area and devastated the community, officials told the Los Angeles Times. The Santa Ynez Reservoir is connected to the Los Angeles water supply system, and authorities said it was shut down for repairs at the time the fires erupted, “leaving a 117 million gallon water storage complex empty in the heart of the Palisades,” the newspaper reported on Friday. The news comes as people are questioning why firefighters ran out of water as they tried to save structures and communities from the blaze that has wreaked havoc across the...

A large reservoir in Pacific Palisades that is part of the Los Angeles water supply system was out of use when a ferocious wildfire destroyed thousands of homes and other structures nearby. Officials told The Times that the Santa Ynez Reservoir had been closed for repairs to its cover, leaving a 117 million gallon water storage complex empty in the heart of the Palisades. The revelation comes among growing questions about why firefighters ran out of water while battling the blaze. Numerous fire hydrants in higher-elevation streets of the Palisades went dry, leaving firefighters struggling with low water pressure as...

I took a boat through 96 million black plastic balls on the Los Angeles reservoir to find out why they're there. The first time I heard about shade balls the claim was they reduce evaporation. But it turns out this isn't the reason they were introduced. Huge thanks to LADWP for arranging this special tour for me. Next time let's put the GoPro on the submersible! The balls are made of high density polyethylene (HDPE) which is less dense than water so they float on the surface of the reservoir even if they break apart. They are 10cm (4 inches)...

Desperate to preserve its water supply amid a four-year drought, Los Angeles is turning a reservoir into a ball pit. It may not seem like the most scientific approach, but officials say the “shade balls” will protect valuable H2O in the City of Angels. Bringing new meaning to the term “throwing shade,” authorities claim the black, plastic balls will preserve the Van Normal reservoir’s water supply in several ways. (excerpt)see all at link:https://www.rt.com/usa/312219-shade-balls-california-drought/

Just after 5 a.m. on May 28, Tempe police officers responded to an apparent disturbance between Bickings and a woman at the Tempe Center for the Arts, which sits on a promenade along the Tempe Town Lake, a reservoir in the city. In its statement, the city referred to Bickings as "unsheltered." Body-camera footage released by the city shows officers approach and speak to a woman who identified herself as Bickings's wife. As she picked up her belongings off the ground, she explained that she and Bickings sometimes have disagreements but said that he did not physically harm her. Two...

Some residents in Manatee County, Florida, were evacuated from their homes over Easter weekend as officials cited fears that a wastewater pond could collapse "at any time." Florida Governor Ron DeSantis declared a state of emergency for the area on Saturday. County officials said the pond, located at the former Piney Point phosphate processing plant, has a "significant leak," according to CBS affiliate WTSP-TV. The Manatee County Public Safety Department told people near the plant to evacuate due to an "imminent uncontrolled release of wastewater." "A portion of the containment wall at the leak site shifted laterally," said Manatee Director...

The Chestnut Hill Reservoir in Brighton, at the 22-mile mark of the Boston Marathon course, was the site of a dramatic rescue on September 24. Katie Kellner, 28, who is a member of the BAA racing team, was three miles into what was supposed to be an easy 60-minute run, which included a loop around the 1.5-mile reservoir. She witnessed a dog swimming in the water and a man on the shore calling to the dog. He was a dog walker, who handed off two other dogs to a bystander, then went into the water to pursue the loose dog,...

Michigan has thousands of aging and under-maintained dams that could pose localized risks. The Michigan Department of Environmental Quality tells the Detroit Free Press that all but six of the state's 88 potential high-hazard dams are approaching 50 years old, the average engineered life span for a dam. The American Society of Civil Engineers gave Michigan a D grade on the condition of its dams in 2009, saying more than 90 percent of the state's nearly 2,600 dams would reach or exceed their design life by 2020.

Rising water filling up Santa Clara County's Anderson Reservoir, which was 99.3 percent full as of Wednesday, is expected to flow over the dam's spillway as a result of this week's impending storms. Unlike the potentially catastrophic situation with Lake Oroville's emergency spillway, the Anderson Reservoir's operational spillway is not at risk of failure, according to Santa Clara Valley Water District officials. Despite that good news, officials in Santa Clara County are warning residents living along Coyote Creek and near Kelley Park to be on the lookout for potential flooding. Water officials for the past month have been releasing water...

Water releases from Shasta Lake are at the highest in 20 years as the lake nears full capacity Monday. The lake stood at 96 percent of capacity and 137 percent of the historical average, as of midnight Monday, according to the California Department of Water Resources. Water officials are releasing 70,000 cubic feet per second (cfs) from Shasta Dam as the lake stands just 5 feet from the top of the reservoir, the Shasta County Sheriff's Office said. "This is higher than it should be for this point in time," the sheriff's office said. "The release is necessary for space...

Just 18 months after many California lakes were nearly dried up, the state now has too much of a good thing. California has now seen more moisture in the last 8 weeks than it typically does in an entire year. Parts of the Sierra Mountain range have received more than 400” of snow already this season with some coastal and foothills locations pulling in over 2 feet of rain… and their typical wet season has nearly 2 months to go. San Francisco, Sacramento, Los Angeles, and several other cities have recorded one of their wettest Januarys on record and an...

Releases from Shasta Dam at 20-year highWater releases from Shasta Lake are at the highest they've been in 20 years as the lake nears full capacity Monday. The lake stood at 96 percent of capacity and 137 percent of the historical average, as of midnight Monday, according to the California Department of Water Resources. Water officials are releasing 70,000 cubic feet per second (cfs) from Shasta Dam as the lake stands just 5 feet from the top of the reservoir, the Shasta County Sheriff's Office said. "This is higher than it should be for this point in time," the sheriff's...