Newsom signs order to expedite California levee repair ahead of the next wet winter

In anticipation of potentially record-setting rainfall and snow for the second consecutive winter, California Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) on Friday signed an executive order to prepare for the next wet season.

The order serves to expedite levee repairs and debris removal to help communities that were inundated with precipitation this winter to get ready for what could come, according to the governor’s office. 

“The State has experienced over 30 atmospheric rivers since December 2022, resulting in compounding and cumulative impacts across California, including record or near record amounts of snow in the Sierra Nevada,” the order states. 

Damaged levees provide weaker protection from high water levels, while debris and vegetation in river channels decrease capacity to move these flows, the governor’s office noted.

“Removal must expeditiously occur before the next rainy season begins in fall 2023 in order to mitigate the risk of additional flooding and allow for continued recovery efforts,” the order reads. 

Following the signing of the order, public agencies will be able to streamline their emergency repair work — particularly in the San Joaquin River, the Tulare Lake Basin, the Salinas River and the Pajaro River regions.

The order suspends certain laws and regulations that required agencies to comply with specified environmental and resource protection requirements, for the sake of accelerating the repairs and removals.

Among the moratoriums are lake and streambed alteration laws and regulations implemented by the California Department of Fish and Wildlife, as well as waste discharge requirements overseen by the California Water Board, per the order.   

The executive order also suspends the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) — environmental impact assessments required by section 21000 of the Public Resources Code — as far as the emergency repair and removal work is concerned.

This pause in the application of CEQA to such work comes after Newsom last month signed into law a package of bills that aim to cut red tape associated with infrastructure projects. 

Within that package were measures to address cumbersome elements of CEQA, regardless of opposition from some of his Democratic colleagues and environmental groups to parts of his agenda.

The executive order signed on Friday, however, emphasizes that all the suspensions apply only to the repair or replacement of existing conveyance and flood-control infrastructure, as well as to debris and sediment removal and vegetation management.