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The underpinning issue is existing water rights and the Fifth Amendment. California has already issued rights to use that water, and the Fifth Amendment says:
by everforward 4y ago
The underpinning issue is existing water rights and the Fifth Amendment. California has already issued rights to use that water, and the Fifth Amendment says:
"nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation."
So we can't just remove access to the water without the state paying for it. That's going to be expensive. Especially since a lot of these rights are for perpetuity (i.e. the water rights are conferred by owning land next to the river, without a contract/permit that expires). How do you "justly" price an eternal supply of a scarce resource? Especially of a resource that could be priceless in the not-too-distant future.
It'll either take a constitutional amendment (with potentially wide-reaching consequences), or a lot of money and probably a decade or two of court cases. No businesses will willingly hand over their water rights when water is scarce enough the state is trying to claw it back.
- loudmax 4y agoThere's an argument to be made that water should be treated as public good, like air, rather than as private property. Water rights are an abstraction, much like copyrights. If the concept of owning rights to water is doing more economic harm than good, it should be reconsidered.
- tomrod 4y agoEminent Domain is how the 5th amendment is worked around. Also, declaring water to be a public good can assist.
- function_seven 4y agoNo it's not. Eminent Domain still involves paying for the thing you're taking. If my house is in the way of a planned freeway, they don't just kick me out and say "tough shit". They pay me. That's the essence of the parent comment. What's the price for these water rights?
- tomrod 4y ago> they don't just kick me out and say "tough shit". They pay me. They do if they don't pay you, like what happened to folks in Louisiana or Texas.
- function_seven 4y agoThat's not "working around" the 5th Amendment, it's ignoring it. And if you're going to ignore the Constitution, you don't need Eminent Domain or anything else. You just ignore it. What are you referring to in Louisiana and Texas?
- stjohnswarts 4y agoYou're right. There's no way any judge will let California turn into a wasteland because "muh water rights". They will give them a reasonable amount and that will be that. I see lots of these cases coming up if the western United States drought doesn't relent soon.
- kornhole 4y agoI heard the consultants working on this in a recent presentation propose creating a fund payed into by all farmers and then paying some farmers from that fund to fallow their fields.
- hwillis 4y ago???? The number of pre-1914 water rights (when california started doing water rights for all use) is very small, and any increase in use requires an new modern right regardless. They're not really relevant. Post-1914 and non-riparian water rights are not "private property", they're leases. They're not just valid forever and the fifth amendment doesn't mean they're immune to modification. https://www.nrdc.org/experts/doug-obegi/no-water-rights-ca-are-above-law-despite-sfs-claims https://www.nrdc.org/experts/doug-obegi/no-water-rights-ca-a...
- jrs235 4y agoThen institute a Use tax on water or a water recovery tax on goods produced based on the approximate number of gallons of water to produce the goods?