Canal-Aqueduct Tunnel Project Near Tracy May Ease State Water Wars
TRACY (KCBS) - The promise of reliable water supplies in one of the areas hardest hit by drought and job losses brought together U.S. Senator Dianne Feinstein and Interior Secretary Ken Salazar Thursday for a project designed to ease the conditions.
Feinstein and Salazar were among the dignitaries at the groundbreaking of the Delta-Mendota Canal/California Aqueduct Intertie Project near Tracy.
KCBS' Bob Melrose Reports:
The "intertie" or short canal will be a 500-foot underground canal and pumping station that would move water from the state-controlled California Aqueduct to the federally controlled Delta-Mendota Canal, in hopes to ease the state's water wars. Sen. Feinstein said those water wars have to stop.
"Unless we take strong action, California is on its way to becoming a desert state. We essentially have the same water infrastructure that we had when we were 16 million people and we're now 38 million people," urged Feinstein.
The intertie would be fully operational by 2012 and would cost $28 million. $15.8 million of that would be funded by the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act and $8.8 million would come from CALFED funding, according to a States News Service press release.
(© 2010 CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.)
