Signs of the water crisis on California's coast

The juxtaposition of the vast ocean in front of me, the scorched hillsides behind me, and the mud-filled, debris-strewn land in between.

The road to Santa Barbara from Carpinteria, CA had opened just a few days earlier after workers had cleared the mud and debris. The short 11-mile drive brought us through some of most severe damage from the January mudslides. Every hotel and most of the parking was filled with transplanted workers to aid in the pumping, debris-clearing, and restoration of the surrounding impacted regions. By the time I arrived, most of the work had already been completed, but traces of the mudslides and wildfires appeared to be rampant. The highway walls showed the highest mud levels, the yards of the houses were full to the brim of debris, and the riverbeds revealed washed out, thin vegetation. Piles of trees, vegetation, and garbage filled the shoreline.

"A flood, the Dutch say, is a terrible thing to waste," - Emilie Bahr, 'The Water Within.'

From the outside, it seems that for the past year, California has either been on fire or flooding. The wildfires remind us how devoid of water the state is and strip the land of the vegetation that holds it together and transports water into the underground stores. The floods bring desperation as we see that neither the land nor our fabricated reservoirs can store the much-needed water. But the rain does spur some flora growth, which is then ripe for burning during the next heat wave and wildfire. Then, as in Santa Barbara, a heavy storm washes away the unsteady land. We have depleted California of the water it needs to hold itself together and now, faced with a pendulum that swings between copious rains and wildfires, the interconnections of the hydrological cycle become overtly apparent.

The state of California has succeeded in several water conservation efforts. "Total urban water use has been falling even as the population grows. Even before the latest drought, per capita water use had declined significantly—from 232 gallons per day in 1995 to 178 gallons per day in 2010—reflecting substantial efforts to reduce water use through pricing incentives and mandatory installation of water-saving technologies like low-flow toilets and shower heads." - Public Policy Institute of California.

Driving the same road to Santa Barbara, signs dotted the landscape along the highway that stated "USING RECYCLED WATER." Once we arrived onto the UC-Santa Barbara campus, we encountered more signs referring to the irrigation of the landscape using reclaimed and recycled water. The scorched hillsides and mudslide damages in the backdrop of these signs seemed to put them on a pedestal. These efforts are becoming increasingly important, however, the overarching approach to using and valuing water must change to create a viable future for California and several other drought-stricken states such as my new home, Utah.

I couldn't help but think of Emilie Bahr's piece, "The Water Within," which explores the impact of the August 2017 flood event in New Orleans as a reflection on the water management in that city. All the pumping trucks and personnel that Santa Barbara had brought in were a critical part of the daily survival of New Orleans. The city had installed man-made levees to stop the annual river floods, but without these floods and the associated sediment deposits, the land began to sink. Today, only half of New Orleans lies at or above sea-level. Could California's depletion of groundwater lead to large-scale land changes? If not sinking, what other unintended consequences will be see if we fail to change our habits surrounding water?