The Definition of Environmental Justice and the Designation of the California Office of Planning and Research as Coordinating Agency for Environmental Justice

State of California | November 18th, 2019

The doctrine of reserved water rights. What are federal and tribal reserved water rights?

California Department of Water Resources (DWR) | January 1st, 2009

The doctrine of reserved water rights evolved to ensure that Indian reservations and public lands set aside by the federal government would have sufficient water to fulfi

The doctrine of reserved water rights evolved to ensure that Indian reservations and public lands set aside by the federal government would have sufficient water to fulfill the purposes for which they were established. Whereas most western water rights (state-based appropriative rights) have a priority date based on when water was first put to beneficial use, federal reserved water rights have a priority date that goes back at least as far as the date on which the lands were set aside. The reserved water rights doctrine is rooted in a number of judicial decisions, beginning with a U.S. Supreme Court decision that has come to be called the Winters Doctrine. The case of Winters vs United States involved a dispute between Native Americans of the Ft. Belknap Reservation and nonnative settlers over the use of the Milk River in Montana. When the water use of the settlers upstream from the reservation interfered with the Indians' water need for large Irrigation diversions, the U.S. government filed a lawsuit on the reservation's behalf. The Winters decision held that when Congress created the Ft. Belknap Reservation, sufficient water to make the Indians a "pastoral and civilized People" was implicitly set aside. Therefore, although the normative settlers had perfected their water rights under Montana state law, the water right of the Indians of Ft. Belknap was prior, or senior in use.

The economic value of local water supplies in Los Angeles

Nature Portfolio (Springer Nature) | May 21st, 2018

Los Angeles imports water over long distances to supplement local supplies. Reduced reliability of the available imports is driving many local agencies to promote conserv

Los Angeles imports water over long distances to supplement local supplies. Reduced reliability of the available imports is driving many local agencies to promote conservation and enhance local water sources. These include stormwater capture, water reuse and groundwater. But financial considerations are often a significant impediment to project development, especially when comparing new and existing sources. Here we demonstrate a comprehensive approach for evaluating the economic implications of shifting to local water reliance in Los Angeles County. We show that local water supplies are economically competitive. Results from integrated hydroeconomic modelling of urban water in Los Angeles identify cost-effective water supply portfolios and conservation targets. Considering costs across the ‘full-cycles’ of urban water supply that span agency boundaries yields better comparisons of planning alternatives. Throughout the region, many water retailers could successfully mitigate effects of imported water cuts while still supporting drought-tolerant landscapes, but some would suffer due to over-reliance on imports. Updating economic assessment methods would support needed innovations to achieve local reliance in Los Angeles, including infrastructure investments, institutional reforms, many more drought-tolerant landscapes and reallocated groundwater rights.

The Endangered Species Act (ESA) and Claims of Property Rights “Takings”

Congressional Research Service (CRS) | January 7th, 2013

The federal Endangered Species Act (ESA) has long been one of the major flash points in debates over government interference with property rights. This report outlines th

The federal Endangered Species Act (ESA) has long been one of the major flash points in debates over government interference with property rights. This report outlines the ESA provisions most relevant to the act’s impacts on private property and surveys the major ESA-relevant principles of Fifth Amendment takings law. The Takings Clause of the Fifth Amendment promises “just compensation” when government actions “take” property. The report then summarizes the court decisions on whether particular government actions (or inaction) based on the ESA “take” private property under the Fifth Amendment. The cases to date address several kinds of ESA impacts on private property: (1) restrictions on land uses that might adversely affect species listed as endangered or threatened, and mitigation conditions to offset the impacts of development; (2) administrative delays; (3) reductions in water delivery or allowable water diversion to preserve lake levels or instream flows needed by listed fish (currently the most active area of ESA takings litigation); (4) restrictions on the defensive measures a property owner may take to protect his/her property from listed animals; and (5) restrictions on commercial dealings in listed species. To date, only one of the 18 ESA-based takings cases disclosed by research, Tulare Lake Basin Water Storage District v. United States, has found a taking. However, two cases, Casitas Municipal Water District v. United States and Klamath Irrigation District v. United States, have yet to be finally resolved and may or may not result in holdings that takings occurred.

The Evolution of Metropolitan’s Agricultural Partnerships

Metropolitan Water District of Southern California (MWD) | August 5th, 2022

The Human Right to Water Bill in California

University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley) | July 1st, 2013

The Pine Flat Project on Kings River, California

Kings River Water Users Committee | December 1st, 1979

The Public Trust Doctrine and California Water Law: National Audubon Society v. Department of Water and Power

University of California College of the Law, San Francisco (UC Law SF) | June 15th, 1982

Conflicting demands on dwindling surface water supplies in California have led to frequent challenges of state decisions to grant diversions of water that impair or destr

Conflicting demands on dwindling surface water supplies in California have led to frequent challenges of state decisions to grant diversions of water that impair or destroy ecological, recreational, or other instream uses of surface waters. This Comment examines the fundamental problems of surface water allocation in California and addresses the possibility of incorporating the public trust doctrine into the current water law system. The Comment then evaluates a recent attempt to apply the public trust doctrine in National Audubon Society v. Department of Water and Power. The Comment concludes by offering an alternative means to public trust protection of California's surface waters.

The Public Trust Doctrine in Natural Resource Law: Effective Judicial Intervention

Berkeley Law Scholarship Repository | January 1st, 1969

Public concern about environmental quality is beginning to be felt in the courtroom. Private citizens, no longer willing to accede to the efforts of administrative agenci

Public concern about environmental quality is beginning to be felt in the courtroom. Private citizens, no longer willing to accede to the efforts of administrative agencies to protect the public interest, have begun to take the initiative themselves. One dramatic result is a proliferation of lawsuits in which citizens, demanding judicial recognition of their rights as members of the public, sue the very governmental agencies which are supposed to be protecting the public interest. While this Article was being written, several dozen such suits were initiated-to enforce air and water pollution laws in states where public agencies have been created for that purpose; to challenge decisions of the Forest Service about the use of public land under its control; to question the Secretary of the Interior's regulation of federal offshore oil leases; and, in a myriad of cases against state and local officials, to examine airport extensions, highway locations, the destruction of parklands,  dredging and filling, oil dumping, and innumerable other governmental decisions dealing with resource use and management.  

The Public Trust Doctrine: Assessing Its Recent Past & Charting Its Future

University of California, Davis (UC Davis) | January 1st, 2012

For over four decades, the public trust doctrine has served as a foundational principle of modern environmental and natural resources law. This issue of the UC Davis Law

For over four decades, the public trust doctrine has served as a foundational principle of modern environmental and natural resources law. This issue of the UC Davis Law Review , and the related, major symposium that drew a standing-room-only audience to King Hall in March 2011, demonstrate the continuing vitality of the public trust. The scholarship featured in these pages continues the UC Davis Law School’s leadership role concerning the doctrine, examines its recent development, and poses key questions regarding its future course. Much has been written about the public trust doctrine, and the articles in this volume explore many of its nuances and implications. Simply stated, however, the doctrine provides that certain natural resources are held by the government in a special status — in “trust” — for current and future generations. Government officials may neither alienate those resources in to private ownership nor permit their injury or destruction. To the contrary, those officials have an affirmative, ongoing duty to safeguard the long-term preservation of those resources for the benefit of the general public.