Water

County Supervisor Kuehl and Chief Sustainability Officer Gary Gero catch up on the county's water resiliency plan.

Los Angeles water experts convened to discuss how integrated solutions could provide resilient and clean local water supply in an era of climate change.

At VerdeXchange 2017, Los Angeles County Supervisor Sheila Kuehl announced her plans to introduce a motion to develop a countywide funding measure for stormwater capture and management.

Recently, Los Angeles County brought on Gary Gero as its first ever Chief Sustainability Officer. VX News sat down with Gero to outline his strategies for achieving stormwater, clean energy, and public transportation goals.

Last month, the White House Council on Environmental Quality partnered with the California State Water Resources Control Board and other agencies to launch the California Water Data Challenge. State Water Board Chair Felicia Marcus joined VX News to discuss the importance of leverage publicly available data to support creative solutions to California’s water challenges.

VX News checks in with Metropolitan Water District of Southern California General Manager Jeff Kightlinger on how water management continues to evolve in response to climate change and drought.

Every day brings reports of urgent water shortages around the world; there’s no time to lose in the search for solutions. In 2008, Time Magazine named Gidon Bromberg, Nader Al-Khateeb, and Munqeth Mehyar “Heroes of the Environment” for their work as co-directors of EcoPeace Middle East, a unique organization that brings together Jordanians, Palestinians, and Israelis to cooperate on protecting and restoring their shared environmental heritage. Bromberg joins VX News to share EcoPeace’s success on watershed restoration in the Jordan River Valley, and its vision of sustainable regional development leading to lasting peace.

With extreme rain forecasted this winter, after years of record-setting drought, Southern California must prepare both to take advantage of the precipitation and to ensure it does not cause harm. Deputy Director of Los Angeles County’s Department of Public Works Gary Hildebrand spoke with VX News about preparation measures targeted to this year’s El Niño, noting that the agency remains prepared, even in the absence of this storm, for major precipitation events. He highlights storm-water capture, reuse, and infiltration operations that take place year-round, as well as the challenges brought by California’s ongoing drought. Finally, he offers his perspective on the much-contested LA River—explaining his agency’s role in its management, considering its flood-control capabilities, and evaluating proposed changes to its function in the city.

Santa Monica Mountains Conservancy Founding Executive Director Joe Edmiston is among the original champions of the LA River, who long understood it as an opportunity for green space rather than simply a concretized channel. Now, Edmiston expresses his support for Frank Gehry joining these ongoing efforts. Edmiston also comments on the California drought and its impacts on parkland.

Jeff Kightlinger, general manager of the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California, updates VX News readers on a new initiative through MWD and the LA County Sanitation Districts: a demonstration project that could lead to one of the largest recycled-water projects on the West Coast. Kightlinger notes that, despite this endeavor and other efforts to utilize local water, Southern California will continue to rely on imported water. He touches on progress at the Delta to increase reliability of that supply.