Prioritizing farm worker vaccines a food security matter, state senator says [KTVU TV, Oakland/San Francisco]
… California’s farm workers, a million essential workers, are the working poor, who labor side by side and live in close quarters. It’s the perfect petrie dish for the unbounded spread of all strains of COVID. … State Senator Melissa Hurtado, a daughter of agricultural workers, sees this as a matter of national food and economic security. … Senator and lawyer Anna Caballero has fought for farm workers her entire life and says they are put in an even lower priority tier than other essential workers. Equity demands fairness.
Talks on expanding local pesticide notifications deadlock [Bakersfield Californian]
Efforts to better protect Shafter residents from accidental exposure to pesticides appear to have hit an impasse after local talks broke down late last year and Kern’s ag commissioner this month rejected a senior state official’s attempt at intervention. … With no new proposals on the table, what was supposed to be a grassroots collaboration for improving local air quality has become mired in competing accusations activists are bargaining in bad faith and farmers are hiding valuable information that should be made public. … A policy advocate at the California Farm Bureau, Taylor Roschen, noted that local growers have offered to host community workshops explaining why farmers use pesticides and what restrictions apply, but members of the steering committee were against it.
Citing climate change, LADWP ends free water deal for Long Valley ranchers and sparks anger among conservationists [Los Angeles Times]
… Citing the impacts of climate change and decreased snowpack — as well as the demands of 4 million ratepayers about 300 miles to the south — the DWP has told ranchers they should no longer expect free water for irrigation uses. … The move to end water giveaways has not only angered ranchers, but it has also stunned local officials and environmentalists, who say dewatered pastures will increase the risk of wildfire and reduce sage grouse habitat, among other things. In a joint lawsuit filed by Mono County and the Sierra Club, plaintiffs charge that the DWP failed to properly consider the environmental consequences of its decision.
Colorado River getting saltier sparks calls for federal help [Bloomberg Law]
… Various efforts along the river or tributaries annually remove about 1.2 million tons of salt. But the largest brine-removal system in the basin has been shuttered for two years over earthquake concerns. In December, President Donald Trump’s outgoing administration released a final environmental review on what to do about it. The chosen course: No action, leaving the fate of the project and of salt removal murky. Now local suppliers say they will be pressing the Biden administration to do the opposite.
How the atmospheric river storm affected California’s water supply [Bay Area News Group]
… The soaking system — the region’s first atmospheric river storm of the winter — made an impressive dent in California’s very dry winter. But precipitation totals are still behind historical averages, experts noted Friday. And the state’s water picture, while improved, remains shaky with two months left to go in the winter season. How much rain comes between now and the traditional end of the winter rainy season April 1 will determine whether there will be summer water restrictions and how moderate or ominous the wildfire season will be.
Two Biden priorities, climate and inequality, meet on Black-owned farms [New York Times]
… The administration has promised to make agriculture a cornerstone of its ambitious climate agenda, looking to farmers to take up farming methods that could keep planet-warming carbon dioxide locked in the soil and out of the atmosphere. At the same time, President Biden has pledged to tackle a legacy of discrimination that has driven generations of Black Americans from their farms, with steps to improve Black and other minority farmers’ access to land, loans and other assistance, including “climate smart” production.
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/01/31/climate/black-farmers-discrimination-agriculture.html
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