Coordinated Monitoring of California's Waterways

California knows very little about the overall quality of its waters. California only reports on the health of 22% of its coastal shoreline, 34% of its lakes and reservoirs, and a mere 15% of its rivers and streams. There is no single place where the public can go to determine the health of their local waters, or even the overall health of California's waters.

Numerous federal, state and local water monitoring efforts currently occur with little coordination, severely reducing the utility of available data. Better information is needed to produce better decisionmaking, and to allow the public to make well-informed choices about using and managing its waters. Moreover, better monitoring is needed now to track water quality improvements from hundreds of new projects funded by millions in bond funds, which otherwise will essentially go unmeasured. CCKA’s new interactive maps of the polluted waters of California represent just one of CCKA’s efforts to teach Californians about the water quality issues affecting their local waterways, and inform accurate policy decisions that protect the quality of California waters.

CCKA Is Taking Action

CCKA has drafted and sponsored several state bills to address these issues. SB 729 (Simitian and Perata), signed into law effective 2007, improves enforcement accountability by requiring state water agencies to inform the public quarterly on their specific enforcement activities. SB 1070 (Kehoe), also signed into law effective 2007, requires the state agencies who collect water quality data to coordinate their data collection and reporting activities. The bill also requires the state water agencies to provide the public with online access to all water related information now held internally by those agencies. Cal-EPA and the Resources Agency signed a formal agreement in late 2007 to implement SB 1070 and develop coordinated monitoring; CCKA is working with these agencies in 2008 to develop an inventory of existing monitoring activities.

CCKA will work to ensure that the State Water Board effectively implements these bills and provides the public with the information they need to hold their government accountable and be effective stewards of local waters. CCKA currently is working to increase governance transparency further through SB 1176 (Perata), currently working its way through the Legislature.

CCKA also has been active in ensuring adequate funding for basic water quality monitoring. After focused advocacy, CCKA was successful in ensuring that the 2006-07 state budget included the first significant increase in funding for water quality monitoring in years. Specifically, funding for monitoring was tripled, an increase CCKA has worked to maintain. CCKA will work closely with the State and Regional Water Boards to make sure monitoring funds are appropriately spent and continued in upcoming budgets.

California Coastkeeper Alliance

PO Box 3156, Fremont CA 94539