60 Minutes misses opportunity to identify solutions

Spreck Rosekrans is an Economic Analyst at EDF.

CBS’ 60 Minutes began last night’s show with a piece titled “California: Running Dry”. It was perhaps too much to expect comprehensive coverage of our complex water issues within a 13 minute segment. The show began quoting the adage, sometimes ascribed to Mark Twain, that “whiskey is for drinking and water is for fighting” and offered only the opportunity to spend up to $40 Billion as a way to solve our problems.

As a result, 60 Minutes missed the opportunity to tell its viewers how we can be smarter, and must be smarter, about using water in places like California if we are to support our farms, cities and fisheries in the 21st century.

Much of the segment was devoted to conversation between CBS’s Leslie Stahl and Governor Schwarzenegger, whom she called “California’s action hero governor”. Stahl tried to make Schwarzenegger choose, asking him if we should not simply let Delta smelt go extinct or take water from farms to support our urban centers. In response, Schwarzenegger was persistently optimistic, insisting that California could have it all.

60 Minutes relied heavily on photo ops of dry farmland on the west side of the San Joaquin Valley. They did not mention that these farms have the most “junior” water rights in the State and have long anticipated that their Delta supplies are not reliable. Nor did they mention that many neighboring areas have had full supplies but limited financial incentive to conserve as it is often forbidden to sell conserved supplies across county lines to those in need.

Instead, 60 Minutes focused on the “fish vs. farms” angle, where rulings under the Endangered Species Act to prevent extinction were presented as the sole cause of reduced water availability to the beleaguered west side farms. There was scant mention of the similar hardships suffered by fishermen, and none were interviewed.

It was particularly disappointing that the only solution presented was for Californians to spend up to $40 Billion “for a complete fix” that would include new dams and a peripheral canal. It’s not surprising, but still unfortunate that there was no nuanced analysis showing that dams and a canal are far from proven solutions to California’s water problems. There was no mention of the need for broad financial incentives to ensure improvements in water use statewide. 60 Minutes did not mention that the farmers they featured have had to pay up to $600 per acre-foot if they want to keep their trees alive while their colleagues in neighboring areas pay less than $10 per acre-foot and have no incentive to use state-of-the-art irrigation technology. Nor did 60 Minutes mention that in many parts of the State average water use is less than 100 gallons per person per day, while in other areas, the average is more than 300 gallons per day but homes are not even metered so there is no incentive for conservation. And there was no discussion of how California’s lack of regulation of groundwater is considered last in the nation, even though groundwater provides as much as 40% of our statewide supply in dry years.

Finally 60 Minutes did not cover the comprehensive and historic water policy legislation, passed only 6 weeks ago, that will move California to a more sustainable water future. While they are right that our problems are severe, and that the “whiskey is for drinking and water is for fighting” adage will no doubt persist, 60 Minutes did not tell its viewers about the progress we have made or about the cooperative spirit shared by most in the state to solve these problems.