Comments on 2018 Draft Basin Prioritization Under SGMA Aug 21, 2018 Comment Letters Agency: California Department of Water Resources Subject: 2018 Draft Basin Prioritization under the Sustainable Groundwater Management Act Letter excerpt: The Association of California Water Agencies (ACWA) appreciates this opportunity to provide comments to the Department of Water Resources (DWR) on the 2018 Draft Basin Prioritization under the Sustainable Groundwater Management Act (SGMA), which was released for public comments on May 18, 2018. ACWA represents over 440 public water agencies which are responsible for delivery of over 90% of the water that serves residential, commercial and agricultural needs throughout California. Many ACWA member agencies are “local agencies” which are members of the Groundwater Sustainability Agencies (GSAs) that are responsible for managing groundwater basins and for preparing and implementing Groundwater Sustainability Plans (GSPs) under SGMA. ACWA appreciates the need for the 2018 reprioritization of groundwater basins in recognition of basin boundary modifications and in consideration of “…adverse impacts on local habitat and local stream flows”, and other new information or undated datasets and information, as specified by SGMA. As a result, the 2018 Draft Basin Prioritization, 14 basins have been re-ranked from low or very low to high- or medium-priority and 38 basins previously ranked as high or medium-priority are now ranked as low- or very-low priority and are no longer subject to SGMA. Download comment letter
