This was a "hot" year for water in California. In the midst of a fiscal and water drought, we fought to protect environmental programs in the state budget and advocated for sound water policy in the package of Delta water bills. We pushed for "upstream" action, like strong chemicals regulations and bans on bad chemicals, and worked on "downstream" solutions, like cleaning up the SF Bay and Delta. With the help of our fabulous California members, we pushed the envelope in so many ways. Our members responded repeatedly to our calls for action with letters and emails that helped us "rock the boat" when we needed to put pressure on a legislator or regulatory body.

Erin Brockovich and Clean Water Action staff speak out in support of new Public Health Goal for chrome VI; public comment now accepted until November 2, 2009

Better late than never: Fifteen years after the Academy Award-nominated movie Erin Brockovich brought the dangers of hexavelent chromium exposure to the attention of the public, and five years after a legislature-mandated deadline for the state to set a drinking water standard, the California Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment (OEHHA) finally began to take action. It's probably not a coincidence that the state finally began the process of setting a standard after Clean Water Action and other allies notified them of our intent to initiate legal action for the state's failure to meet its statutory obligation to set a drinking water standard for hexavalent chromium (chromium VI).

On October 19, 2009, OEHHA held a workshop giving an overview of their draft Public Health Goal (PHG) for chromium VI. The proposed PHG specifies a maximum level of 0.06 parts per billion level (ppb) of chromium VI in drinking water (read the draft here). Clean Water Action believes this is a health protective level and supports the proposed goal. At the workshop and at a press conference that preceded it, speakers Erin Brockovich (Brockovich Research & Consulting), Virginia Madueno (Clean Water Action California, Central Valley Organizer), and Renee Sharp (Environmental Working Group California, Executive Director) urged OEHHA to expedite the finalization of this standard. Scott Davis, a resident of the impacted community of Merced, California, also spoke at the press conference. At the workshop, former State Senator Deborah Ortiz (author of SB 351, which mandates the drinking water standard) underscored the real-world impacts of chromium VI and called for the process to move forward quickly

OEHHA has set a deadline of November 2, 2009, for accepting public comment. You can help urge speedy finalization of this PHG by sending a letter to OEHHA; click here for a sample letter: Sample Letter Cal OEHA Chromium VI PHG.

Clean Water Action California Director Miriam Gordon testifies successfully for Natural Resources Committee

On April 27, Clean Water Action helped make significant progress towards banning polystyrene in food packaging when the State Assembly Committee on Natural Resources (NRC) voted to refer AB 1358 (Hill, Nava, Brownley, Monning) to the Committee on Appropriations, after which it will be brought to the floor for a vote. The NRC, chaired by Nancy Skinner (D), voted 6-3 along party lines to pass the bill. As sponsor of the bill, CWA was key to its moving out of the committee as Miriam Gordon, Director of CWA/California, gave supporting testimony to the NRC, underscoring the devastating environmental impact of polystyrene and countering industry testimony that the passage of AB 1358 will result in the loss of jobs.

On October 31, 2008, the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission (SFPUC) adopted its Water System Improvement Program, a $4.5 billion public works project that will seismically upgrade the water system that provides drinking water to 2.4 million Bay Area residents. As part of this program, the SFPUC agreed to cap water sales at the 2001 level of 265 million gallons per day. This agreement marks a giant step in California water policy, and a big victory for Clean Water Action and its allies. It is the successful conclusion to our six year campaign to convince the SFPUC that it did not need to divert an additional 25 million gallons per day from the Tuolumne River to meet the water demands of its customers.

In the aftermath of the Katrina disaster, we can see Californians need to take a serious look at our need to prepare for natural disasters, mainly earthquakes, and lessen our dependency on FEMA and other local institutions. Unlike the Gulf region, there will not be a three-day warning to evacuate and our situation will be complex and include the possibility of flooding, tsunamis, collapsed structures, widespread fires, air and water contamination, injuries and fatalities.

Individuals need to take a leadership role within their communities to prepare everyone for the severity of the emergency we anticipate. The key is that everyone be prepared and organized because lack of preparation will make a bad situation even worse.

Join Clean Water Action at the San Francisco Bay Model on Saturday, April 25th, and see how plastic trash moves with the tides! "Earth Day Tsunami: The Great Wave of Plastic Pollution" offers a day of advocacy, inspiration, and entertainment at the amazing hydraulic model of the Bay, located in Sausalito.

The model is the size of two football fields. Built to scale proportions and accurately demonstrating the action of the Bay's tides, the effects of the tides are observable in minutes. "Earth Day Tsunami" will take advantage of the model's demonstration capability to highlight the powerfully adverse effects that marine debris can have in the Bay.

U.S. Congress and State Offices

Clean Water Action endorsed 234 candidates for federal and state offices in 2008, with 84 percent of them winning their elections. Below are the winning candidates plus one still too call. 

Clean Water Action has endorsed the following pro-environment candidates and positions on ballot Proposition measures.

The Central Valley Regional Water Board will decide on adopting a draft cleanup plan, known as a TMDL (Total Maximum Daily Load), this summer to address mercury pollution in the Delta.

The proposed plan has both positive and negative features and we need your help to ensure that we keep the beneficial aspects and correct the flaws. Specifically, Clean Water Action supports the plan's focus on methylmercury (the form that collects in living things so that people are exposed by eating highly contaminated fish).

By reducing this form of mercury in the short term, we can help protect people and wildlife who eat Delta fish over the many decades it will take to completely clean up the watershed.

Did you know that there are approximately 80,000 chemicals in commercial use but that for most of them, we have done little or no testing for their potential health or environmental impacts? As a result our household cleaners, garden chemicals and pesticides, personal care products, computers, clothes, food, and even our beds may contain chemicals about which we have little safety information.