California is midway through its third year of drought and officials from the Department of Water Resources (DWR) say the Central Coast is one of the state’s most vulnerable regions.
January through March of this year were the driest of those months on record in California. And March 2022 was both warmer and drier than March of 2020.
“This year we received, in March, just one inch of [precipitation] and we were three degrees warmer than the average temperature,” said Lisa Lien-Mager with the California Natural Resources Agency.
Lien-Mager spoke at a meeting Tuesday with officials from the DWR and the State Water Board to discuss the state’s drought outlook.
Jeanine Jones is the Interstate Resources Manager with the DWR. She said a number of things make the Central Coast more vulnerable to drought.
“[There are] relatively less groundwater resources available in the Central Coast than in other parts of the state and it does not have the major sources of imported water that other areas have,” Jones said.
Jones also said Lake Cachuma, one of Santa Barbara County’s water reservoirs, isn’t holding as much as it could.
“Currently Lake Cachuma is at 59 percent of average right now, so you know, starting to see a decline there,” Jones said.
She said, due to shortages, areas including Cambria on the North Coast, already have moratoriums on new connections to water systems.
“And I would also point out that some of the small coastal communities really don’t have enough water to reliably serve their areas now,” Jones said.
San Luis Obispo County does receive an allocation of water from the State Water Project, but state water officials announced a cut to this year’s supply in March.
“There are very few years now where the state water project can deliver a full allocation to their customers,” Jones said.
Jones said as the climate continues to get warmer and drier, communities need to be prepared for continued reductions in state supply.