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Coalition files for reconsideration after CA Water Board denies call to cancel Delta Tunnel petition [1]

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Date: 2025-05-13

Sacramento, CA – In the latest battle in the stop Governor Gavin Newsom’s Delta Tunnel, a broad coalition of thirty-two California Native Tribes, environmental justice organizations, Delta counties, water agencies and other Delta advocates has filed a Petition for Reconsideration with the State Water Resources Control Board.

The petition urges the agency to reverse its April 11 decision denying a motion to cancel the Department of Water Resources’ (DWR) Change Petition for the Delta Conveyance Project (DCP).

The Petitioners include the Shingle Springs Band of Miwok Indians, Winnemem Wintu Tribe, Little Manila Rising, Restore the Delta, San Francisco Baykeeper, California Indian Environmental Alliance, Golden State Salmon Association, Friends of the River, California Sportfishing Protection Alliance, California Water Impact Network, Center for Biological Diversity, North Coast Rivers Alliance, Sierra Club California, Planning and Conservation League, Save California Salmon, County of San Joaquin, County of Contra Costa, Contra Costa County Water Agency, County of Solano, County of Yolo, Local Agencies of the North Delta, County of Sacramento, Sacramento County Water Agency, City of Stockton, Sacramento Area Sewer District, Byron-Bethany Irrigation District, South Delta Water Agency, Central Delta Water Agency, North Delta Water Agency, Reclamation District 999, Reclamation District 2060, and Reclamation District 2068.

“The original motion to cancel the petition — filed earlier this year — was based on DWR’s repeated failure to submit required supplemental information about the State Water Project’s historic water use, as ordered by the Administrative Hearing Officer (AHO),”: the coalition wrote in a statement. “That data is critical to determining whether the proposed Delta Tunnel would initiate a new water right and its potential impacts on existing users and ecosystems. Despite numerous extensions, DWR failed to produce the data.”

“Now, troubling new developments have emerged. In a separate but related DCP legal proceeding last week, the State Water Contractors — who are financially and operationally tied to the Delta Tunnel project — filed a motion for a protective order that would prevent the AHO and the Water Board from seeking the very information at issue in the coalition’s Petition for Reconsideration,” the coalition stated.

“Though the protective order was filed in a different case, the implications are profound. The Contractors who have not themselves been required to present any information — are seeking to relieve DWR from the obligation to present the supplemental water use data to the AHO, effectively shielding DWR’s past levels of water export from scrutiny and interfering with the ongoing water rights hearing process,” the coalition added.

Noting that DWR’s provision of the water use data was originally due in December 2024, Gary Mulcahy, Governmental Liaison of the Winnemem Wintu Tribe, said, "We are giving the State Water Resources Control Board one more opportunity to uphold the law and stop giving DWR preferential treatment."

“The coalition’s Petition for Reconsideration argues that the Board erred in allowing the Change Petition to move forward without full compliance with data requirements formulated by the Administrative Hearing Officer,” according to the coalition. “The new attempt to interfere with the provision of this basic water diversion data by the State Water Contractors only strengthens the case for immediate reconsideration.”

“This is about upholding the law and protecting the integrity of the process,” said Cintia Cortez, Policy Manager with Restore the Delta. “The Water Board must not condone DWR’s ongoing attempts, now being delivered through the State Water Contractors, to withhold critical information. Allowing the water rights hearing to move forward without transparency and accountability sets a dangerous precedent and continues the harm to Delta communities and the environment.”

Legal advocates point out that the State Water Contractors’ motion, though technically separate, is “part of a broader pattern of obstruction.”

“For instance, just last week, DWR was threatening to file a motion to disqualify counsel for several local entities protesting the water rights changes sought by DWR, potentially leaving disadvantaged communities like Stockton without counsel in this critical water rights proceeding. To date, nothing has come of that threat,” the coalition revealed.

Eric Buescher, Managing Attorney at San Francisco Baykeeper explained, “State law is clear about the State Water Board's authority and responsibility to ensure that water rights proceedings are fair and complete. But DWR seems to believe that it is only obligated to follow those rules if it wants to, justifying its brazen conduct on the purported need for more and bigger ways to extract water from the Bay and Delta.

“But the DCP would be a disaster for the watershed, ecosystem, and for communities throughout the Delta, and it is vital that DWR be held to the same standards as every other water right applicant. The State Board should stand up for its own authority, independence, and integrity and cancel DWR's petition,” he observed.

“California’s Water Code requires the Board to cancel a petition for a change in water rights where, as here, the petitioner fails without good cause to timely submit information required for a complete and fully-informed hearing,” said Stephanie Safdi, Director of the Yale Environmental Justice Law and Advocacy Clinic and counsel for the Delta Tribal Environmental Coalition. “The Delta Tribal Environmental Coalition and the other thirty-two signatories to this Petition for Reconsideration are calling on the State Water Board to uphold the law and end the DCP change petition proceedings.”

Environmental justice and water equity advocates say the maneuvering from project backers “only reinforces the need for stronger community oversight.”

The coalition is calling on the State Water Board to grant the Petition for Reconsideration and “reaffirm its commitment to a fair, transparent, and lawful review of the Delta Conveyance Project.”

Background: Follow The Big Ag Money

Newsom’s push for the Delta Tunnel may have something to do with the fact that Beverly Hills Billionaires Linda and Stewart Resnick, owners of the Wonderful Company and the largest orchard fruit growers in the world, are among the largest contributors to Governor Newsom and hosted his 2022 anti-recall campaign in a fundraising letter. The Resnicks have donated a total of $431,600 to Governor Gavin Newsom since 2018, including $250,000 to Stop The Republican Recall Of Governor Newsom and $64,800 to Newsom For California Governor 2022. Newsom received a total of $755,198 in donations from agribusiness in the 2018 election cycle, based on the data from www.followthemoney.org. That figure includes a combined $116,800 from Stewart and Lynda Resnick and $58,400 from E.J. Gallo, combined with $579,998 in the agriculture donations category. But the Resnicks are also huge contributors to the University of California system and other universities in the state. In 2019 they made a donation of $750 million to Caltech and in 2022 made a $50 million donation to UC Davis, in addition to contributing millions to UCLA, CSU Fresno and other universities over the years. The Resnicks have pushed for increased water exports from the Delta for agribusiness and the construction of the Delta Tunnel for many years.

The Resnicks have donated many millions of dollars to both the Democratic and Republican parties and to candidates for both parties over the years. They were instrumental in the creation of the Monterey Amendment, a 1994 pact between Department of Water Resources and State Water Project contractors, that allowed them to obtain their 57 percent stake in the Kern Water Bank: https://www.watereducation.org/aquapedia/monterey-amendment

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[1] Url: https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2025/5/13/2322102/-Coalition-files-for-reconsideration-after-CA-Water-Board-denies-call-to-cancel-Delta-Tunnel-petition?pm_campaign=front_page&pm_source=more_community&pm_medium=web

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